Ipswich Town manager Kieran McKenna has revealed that his decision to replace Marcelino Nunez so soon after bringing him on as a substitute during this afternoon’s East Anglian derby was motivated by the desire to keep 11 players on the pitch.
As expected, former Norwich City midfielder Nunez was public enemy number one during the 2-0 victory at Carrow Road.
The Chilean started the contest on the bench, and he was introduced into the action in the 61st minute.
Ipswich Town midfielder Marcelino Nunez. Picture: Barry Goodwin
However, after being cautioned and committing two more fouls, McKenna opted to take Nunez back off and bring on Dan Neil with six minutes remaining.
The Town boss explained: “He’s coming back from injury, played a little bit longer than we would have liked the other day with the Azor (Matusiwa) going off (against Birmingham). So we need to protect him with the game schedule that we have because he’s so important to us. Of course, we also knew that was going to add extra to the atmosphere and that might not necessarily be something that would help the team.
“He was always going to come on the pitch and have a part in trying to get us the victory though and it obviously got a little bit heated out there and emotions were running high.
“So we had to protect the team and protect Marcelino in that situation, the same as we did, to be fair, with Leif (Davis), (George) Hirst and Anis (Mehmeti) – the boys on yellows – because it was really important to stay with 11 today.
“At that stage, as our crowd would do, they were trying to get people sent off. So it was important to get as many of the yellow cards off the pitch as we could.
“He’s through this one now, he’s tackled it head-on, you could say, and can hopefully have a big part to play now in the run-in.”