Ipswich in promotion driving seat but little is ever as it seems with Championship

Kieran McKenna’s team face a crunch clash with Middlesbrough but charging Southampton loom large

At the end of July, Ipswich and Middlesbrough reached an agreement. If the Boro midfielder Hayden Hackney agreed personal terms he could join the Suffolk club, freshly relegated and awash with ready funds, for a Championship record fee of around £20m. Kieran McKenna knew he would be getting the best schemer in the division if his target said yes; a player who could make the difference in a 46-game grind. Perhaps with half an eye on Premier League interest, Hackney heard Ipswich out but turned the transfer down. He would end up staying on Teesside and propelling an often exhilarating promotion chase.

There is little chance of a mutually beneficial outcome when the sides meet at Portman Road on Sunday. Hackney has missed the past four games with a calf injury and it is unclear whether he will be ready in time for a game of potentially seismic consequence. Boro, out at the front with Coventry for so much of the season, have faded without their talisman and drifted to fifth. Their hosts, slow starters but menacingly consistent since September, occupy second place and have played a game less. Goal difference also works in Ipswich’s favour and the equation is simple: Boro must become one of vanishingly few visiting sides to win in Suffolk if they are to retain realistic hopes of going up automatically.

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