McKenna must drop Szmodics and hand Ipswich’s sought-after “diamond” a rare start – opinion

It’s been a mixed start to life for Ipswich Town in the Premier League this season.

Kieran McKenna’s side have looked good in spells and have lost just five out of their first ten games, but they’ve also failed to win a single game.

The Tractor Boys are undoubtedly good enough to beat the drop this year, but they’ll need to tighten up at the back and show more cutting edge in attack to do so.

Therefore, McKenna should make some changes ahead of this afternoon’s clash with Tottenham Hotspur, including dropping Sammie Szmodics.

Why Szmodics should be dropped

Right, the first thing to say is that, yes, Szmodics is an exceptionally talented footballer. After all, he’s the same player who produced a frankly absurd 37 goals and assists for Blackburn Rovers last year.

However, the key phrase there is last season, as so far this year, he hasn’t really looked anything like the same attacking tour de force he was for the Lancashire outfit.

For example, in his ten Premier League appearances this year, totalling 474 minutes, the Irish international has scored just two goals and failed to provide a single assist.

Moreover, despite starting against fellow relegation candidates Leicester City last week, the 29-year-old once again flattered to deceive, failing to take a single shot on target during his 74 minutes of action and receiving a paltry 5/10 match rating from the East Anglian Daily Times’ Alex Jones, who wrote that the attacker was once again ‘too quiet.’

In all, it feels like it might be time to drop Szmodics to the bench for the game this afternoon, as he might be able to have more of an impact coming into a game when the opposition is starting to tire.

Furthermore, with him on the bench, McKenna can hand another of his summer signings, just his fourth league start, and in his natural position no less.

Why McKenna should start Jack Clarke

Yes, the player in question is fellow summer signing Jack Clarke, who completed his £15m move from Sunderland to Portman Road in late August and is supposedly a transfer target for Leicester City.

Now, it would be fair to say that the Englishman hasn’t had the best of starts to life at Ipswich either, and that compared to his barnstorming form for the Black Cats over the last two seasons that saw him rack up a tally of 26 goals and 18 assists in 92 appearances, he’s been somewhat underwhelming.

However, like Szmodics, the talent is undeniably there, but unlike the Irishman, the former Tottenham Hotspur prospect hasn’t had as many chances to prove that since making his move.

In all, he’s made only eight Premier League appearances, totalling 335 minutes, but just three of those have been starts, and it was in one of those starts, against Aston Villa, that the young “diamond”, as former manager Tony Mowbray described him, picked up his one assist.

Furthermore, when you compare some of his creative and defensive statistics to Szmodics’ from this season, such as passes, passes per match, big chances created, tackles and blocked shots, it’s clear he could offer something to the team.

Ultimately, while the former Blackburn ace is an incredibly talented player, he should be dropped this afternoon, and in his place, Clarke should be given his fourth league start of the season to prove that he should be getting more.