I wrote about the prospect of Ipswich Town’s promotion to the Premier League last Friday and considered whether it was overkill to write about football two weeks in a row but it really does need to be done. What a bank holiday weekend it was for the town. Town’s promotion to the Premier League is arguably the single biggest boost for the town for over 20 years.
I was lucky enough to be at Portman Road myself and I can honestly say it was the best footballing moment I’ve ever experienced. Though as a Newcastle fan starved of success over the past 30 years or so, there isn’t a huge amount of competition other than Newcastle’s qualification for the Champions League last year!
I feared that the game last Saturday was going to be a nervy affair and the day wouldn’t all be straight forward. However, the moment we took the lead shortly after we heard Southampton had taken the lead against Leeds, it really did start to feel like we’d done it.
It was over two hours after the final whistle that I finally left the ground and headed to the Town centre for further celebrations.
The bus parade on Monday was a great success and I was very happy to support it when I was asked to do so by the club. Both the borough and county councils as well as Suffolk Police deserve credit for facilitating such a spectacle at such short notice. Readers will be well aware that I haven’t held back when it comes to criticising Ipswich Borough Council over the past year or so but credit where credit is due. The council had all the pressures of running the local elections on the Thursday and Friday and were still able to go again to play a key role in enabling the great celebrations that took place to happen. The teams of borough employees who did such an impressive job at cleaning our town after the festivities also deserve a special mention.
Yesterday, I raised Town’s back to back promotions in the Commons Chamber with the Leader of the House Penny Mordaunt. It was only right that Town’s stunning achievement was officially logged in Parliamentary Hansard for posterity.
The thought of some of the biggest names in world football coming to Ipswich next season is thrilling. Pep Guardiola strolling around the away dugout at Portman Road, Haaland, Salah, Foden, you name it, they’re all coming to Portman Road.
This all comes as an enormous boost not just for the Town but the whole of Suffolk. It’s something to be incredibly proud of and of course so many opportunities now lie in front of us. It’s important that we all work together collaboratively to seize these opportunities to the full.
It was great to see our hospitality sector booming over the weekend. I’ve never seen so many of our pubs, bars and restaurants so full and the great thing is that this is only likely to continue throughout the course of next season.
The players, the manager, the chief executive, the owners, the wider Ipswich Town family and of course the fans, have all played their role in achieving something truly remarkable. They are the talk of the country. I personally get a real buzz when I pick up national newspapers and see our club all over the back pages and sometimes even the front pages!
What a few seasons it has been and there is far more to come.
Tom Hunt is Conservative MP for Ipswich
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