Stevenage FC

Weather Forecast: Cloudy, 21°c

Referee: G Ward (Surrey)

After Saturday’s open day defeat at The Lamex, attention for Stevenage now turns to the visit of Ipswich Town in the first round of the Capital One Cup on Tuesday evening.

Despite the Tractor Boys also suffering a narrow defeat at the weekend Mick McCarthy’s men will prove a whole different proposition to Oldham, with the Championship side boasting a strong squad which looks more than capable of a promotion challenge to the Premier League.

This will be the first competitive meeting between the two sides however Boro did emerge victorious from a 2007 pre-season friendly, winning 3-0 through goals from John Nutter (pen), Ollie Allen and Paul Hakim. Mark Stimson’s men saw off their Championship opposition in clinical style, despite the visitors fielding a full strength team with the likes of experienced players like Jason De Vos, Alan Lee and Jon Walters all starting and hot prospects such as Jordan Rhodes coming off the bench.

Stevenage will be without Dani Lopez for this game as the striker serves the last of his three-match suspension. Filipe Morais and Robin Shroot could come into contention after coming off the bench on Saturday whilst James Dunne could also return from injury.

Ipswich are likely to stick with a similar line-up to that which lost at Reading on Saturday. Defender Aaron Cresswell is a doubt with a thigh injury. 

Ipswich come into this game having suffered an opening day defeat at Reading on Saturday afternoon. Jay Tabb gave the Tractor Boys the lead against his former club before goals from Adam Le Fondre and Danny Guthrie saw the Royals come from behind to win 2-1.

Pre-season for Mick McCarthy’s men was almost faultless with six wins from their seven matches. Victories came against Shelbourne (2-0), Crawley (2-1), Chippenham (1-0), Gillingham (2-1), Barnet (1-0) and Colchester (3-0) with a 3-3 draw recorded at Notts County just over a week ago in their final friendly.

Scott Loach; Elliott Hewitt, Luke Chambers, Tommy Smith, Tyrone Mings; Carlos Edwards, Luke Hyam, Cole Skuse, Jay Tabb; Daryl Murphy, David McGoldrick

Subs from: Frank Nouble, Paul Taylor, Paul Anderson, Dean Gerken, Ryan Tunnicliffe, Christophe Berra, Frederic Veseli

Tommy Smith joined Stevenage Borough on a one-month emergency loan in February 2008, which was later extended until the end of the season. The 17-year old centre-back made 15 appearances in an impressive spell at Broadhall Way before returning to Ipswich. Now an international regular for New Zealand, the defender was named the club’s player of the season last year by fans and recently signed a new three-year deal at Portman Road.

David McGoldrick will also be a familiar name to Boro fans with the striker having scored in both games against Boro last season during a loan spell at Coventry City. The 25-year old scored the opening goal at the Ricoh as Boro came back to win 2-1, and then scored a lovely chip to secure a 3-1 win for Coventry at The Lamex on Boxing Day. His goalscoring exploits in League 1 attracted the attention of a number of Championship sides, with the striker agreeing a switch to Portman Road where he scored four times in 15 appearances towards the end of last season.