Boss Paul Jewell felt fans shouldn't be too downcast after yesterday’s 2-1 home defeat to Leicester City, the Blues’ first home loss since January 2nd. The Town manager believes the club’s form since the turn of the year and climb away from the relegation zone is a sign that progress is being made.

Jewell said: “Let’s have it right, it wasn’t so long ago that we would have been pleased with a comfortable mid-table position.

“I was looking at the fixtures this morning and Coventry were playing Bristol City and that’s where we were looking at at one stage.

“That’s 28 points we’ve got out of the last 15 games, which isn’t far off winning you the league. I’m not saying we’re going to win the league but we have to put things in perspective.

“We’ve had a disappointing second half performance against a team that’s cost an awful lot of money to be assembled.

“People will talk about the play-offs but we were never in the running for the play-offs this season, however, the form we’ve shown of late, 28 points from 15, is an encouraging sign, but we know that there’s a lot of work ahead and a long way to go.”

He says the current situation 17 points away from the relegation zone and nine from the top six in 15th seemed a long way off a little while back: “A few months ago when we couldn’t win a game mid-table where we are now was looking far away. We were in a relegation fight.

“We’ve crawled our way out of that and done a little bit more than that. We have made progress. Yesterday was a disappointing day, there’s no doubt about that but we will live to fight another day and improve over the summer and come back next season better.

“It was three months without a defeat at home [before Monday]. It’s disappointing because we wanted to put on a decent show for our supporters, but we weren’t able to do that in the second half.”

Meanwhile, one of the tabloids has linked Peterborough keeper Joe Lewis with the Blues along with team-mates George Boyd and Paul Taylor.

Jewell played down suggestions that Boyd and Taylor might be summer targets when their names were put to him last week.

Former Norwich man Lewis, 24, has been mentioned in connection with the Blues on more than a few occasions since Jewell took over as manager at Portman Road.

The ex-England U21 is currently not in the Posh first team and is out of contract at the end of the season.

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