Here at FourFourTwo, we restrict our swearing to the essential (most of the time, at least), so let’s just say that Kieran McKenna is hot *stuff* after the events of 2023-24.
Ipswich, who haven’t darkened the doors of the English top flight since Ali G: Indahouse was in da cinemas, have bounded back into the Premier League after successive eye-catching promotions. McKenna, above all else, has been touted as the reason behind that.
Working his way out of the Manchester United academy coaching setup to become an integral figure for Jose Mourinho and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, McKenna took the Ipswich job just two and a half years ago, with the Tractor Boys sitting in a lowly 12th position in League One, following the exit of Paul Cook.
After stabilising their form in the opening months, he guided them to automatic promotion in his first full season, before doing the same in the Championship.
That’s happened because McKenna has made Ipswich one of the most adaptable, aggressive and ambitious sides you could watch anywhere in the world. However, if we learned anything from Vincent Kompany’s Burnley, it’s that the Premier League doesn’t just hold contempt for aspiring new teams with exciting styles of play, it seems to go out of its way to break them entirely.
Are the East Anglian side doomed to suffer a fate of comparable ignominy? Not if their manager has anything to say about it.
01 THE SHAPE
Ipswich played a
