Blues boss Paul Jewell says new centre-half Ibrahima Sonko is in great condition and ready to join fellow signings Jimmy Bullard and Daryl Murphy in the Town side which faces Leeds at Portman Road on Saturday. The trio trained with their new team-mates this morning.

Jewell sad: “He’s in fantastic condition. He’s been training with Reading and they had offered him a contract and I think Nottingham Forest were in for him.

“Luckily we tweeted each other and he came and played in the game on Tuesday. That’s a joke, by the way, I haven’t got Twitter!

“It’s been going on and I’ve been trying to keep it under the radar really. He’s one with experience. He’s strong, he’s aggressive and hopefully he’ll bring in those qualities as we’ve been lacking them.”

The Blues boss is also pleased to have brought Daryl Murphy back to Portman Road on loan from Celtic: “He knows the surroundings and he gives us a bit of versatility. He can play down the middle, wide left, wide right.

“He’s big, he gives us options and can get hold of the ball. I think we’ve probably relied on Michael Chopra too much, asking him to score a goal every time he gets the ball.

“He just gives us that bit of experience and quality. I know he scored after 21 seconds of his debut, so hopefully he can do it again.”

Jewel confirmed that he has spoken to Stoke about two players, almost certainly Ryan Shotton and Danny Collins, and says there could be movement on that front next month when Football League clubs are able to bring players in on 'emergency' loans: “We’ve been in contact with Stoke about a couple of their players and for different reasons it’s not happening at the moment.

“Stoke are in the Europa League, then they play Sunday, then the transfer window closes. I think Stoke are trying to bring players in like every other Premier League club.

“And when they’ve brought players in and they know what they’ve got, it might be easier for us to get some players. That’s the same with every Premier League team and I was exactly the same when I was a Premier League manager.”

Jewell confirmed that, as reported by TWTD yesterday, former Czech U21 international holding midfielder Jiří Bílek is on trial and also revealed that Costa Rican international central defender Francisco Calvo is also at the club: “Jiri’s from Kaiserslautern.

"He’s done very well in training. The game was a little bit different for him, but we’ve got the best of a week to have a look at him. We’ve also got Francisco Calvo here, a, 19-year-old who came from Costa Rica.”

Calvo, who has been capped three times by his country, currently plays for San Jacinto Coyotes, a college team in the United States.

The Town manager says no decision has yet been made on recent Slovenian trialist Aljaž Struna: “We’re monitoring his progress.”

Richard Wright was training with the squad again this morning, but Jewell once again played down the chances of the former Blue rejoining the club, at least in the short-term.

Midfielder Lee Bowyer is a doubt ahead of Saturday’s game with his hamstring problem and was training away from the main group, while defender Ívar Ingimarsson is definitely ruled out.

Tommy Smith and Lee Martin are both sidelined as they are banned for one and three matches respectively for their red cards at Peterborough.

Story syndicated from TWTD.co.uk

Photo: Action Images

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