Ipswich Town manager Kieran McKenna on Nathan Broadhead, MK Dons challenge and 'inspirational' away support

Nathan Broadhead is set to become a regular starter for Ipswich Town, manager Kieran McKenna has confirmed.

The January signing has made a big impression on supporters with his performances already, scoring two goals - including a stunning free-kick - and notching two assists since joining.

However, he has only made four starts since his £1.5m switch from Everton, although the Town boss is expecting to see more of him in the coming weeks.

"He was always, of course, in our mind to be a regular starter," said McKenna in his MK Dons pre-match press conference.

"We didn't bring him in to be anything other than that. As I've said before, he has arrived in the middle of the season coming off the back of a hamstring injury he had going into the World Cup winter break. We knew we had to manage him for the first few weeks to make sure we had him for the run-in and we have him in a good condition at the business end of the season.

"We've done that over the last few weeks, but we think he is a really good player and we see him having a big role to play in terms of starting games."

Town will be looking to make it back-to-back wins for the first time in the league since the end of October when they head to Stadium MK on Saturday (kick-off 3pm).

Kieran McKenna's side will be cheered on by nearly 7,000 away fans, who are likely to outnumber those in the home end.

Reflecting on the trip to MK Dons, when Town were backed by similar numbers, McKenna said: "It was one of my favourite games last year. The atmosphere at the MK game last year, I thought it was really startling and inspirational coming out and seeing the away fans there.

"By the sounds of it, it's going to be similar this year. That's something for us to look forward to and try and deliver the performance to make them (the fans) happy."

That game last year saw Ipswich face an MK Dons team who were challenging for promotion under Liam Manning.

Plenty has changed since then for Buckinghamshire-based side, who now find themselves in a relegation battle under new boss Mark Jackson.

However, McKenna is still wary of the threat they possess.

He continued: "I'm sure they would have expected the season to have gone differently, but that's football, that's the challenge.

"Mark has come in and is trying to put his stamp on it and lift them to a position in the table that is probably more befitting of the quality they have,

"They've changed a lot. They've changed system, a lot of different personnel and different priorities in terms of what they are working on. I think they're a very dangerous transition side at the moment with a big focus on defending zonal and narrow."

While Ipswich will be buoyed by the confidence they gained after the 4-0 thrashing of Forest Green Rovers last week, McKenna knows his side can't afford to get complacent.

"I think we managed to stay pretty calm and focused going into the Forest Green game," he said.

Of course, when you get a win there is a better feeling of confidence in the camp. The atmosphere around the training ground, although it has always been really focused, it's a little bit more positive this week. But we need to take it game-by-game.

"As much as we didn't get to down after the draw at Bristol Rovers, we certainly can't be getting ahead of ourselves because we had a good result and performance last week. We need to back it up, we need to show how hungry we are, how committed we are, and we are going to have to deliver a good performance.

"I know people will look at the last two results and think differently, but we are not naive enough. We've studied them enough to know they're a much more dangerous side than those results would suggest."