How did we not score 6 in the first half? Town were rampant in the first 45 minutes of this match without gaining a worthy advantage to show for it. It seemed Wolves' stuttering start to their season home in this division was going to continue, their brief holiday in the Premiership doing nothing to refresh them it seems.

But it was obvious that Lady Luck was on the side of the Midlanders and after half an hour there was still no goal - we've seen this on plenty of occassions and feared that we might have blown our chances. Thankfully at this point Bent managed to make the breakthrough, hassling the defender and lunging for a Jim Magilton cross he beat his man but missed getting a head on the ball by the narrowest of margins, so narrow that the ball hit the defender and went in. Bent of course claimed the goal.

Most of the forward players on the pitch came close in the closing period of the half, even Jim getting in on the act with an effort which just went over the bar.

One nil at the restart and the Town fans hoped for more of the same, but unfortunately the second half was not as slick. Town did however get another goal courtesy of a Kuqi-won penalty as he was felled in the box whilst running in (obviously on his way in to score), with Miller sticking the ball into the right hand corner. He's getting used to both sides of the goal now...

So with a 2 goal lead it should be easy right? Not so. Wolves were gifted (an unusual phrase there) an equaliser by some "relaxed" defending. They were awarded a free-kick which was quickly whipped in to the waiting heads of about 3 Wolves players, and from there it was 2-1 and a very uncomfortable finish to the game.

Wolves played far better after getting their goal, and the game was about even from that point. At the end of the day though, 2-1 flattered them. They should have been dead, buried and pushing up the daisies by half time. All in all, bar the slight lapse at the back, an excelllent performance by Town. Wolves - well, Sheffield Wednesday anyone?

A carry over from the Tuesday night cup match against Brentford maybe turned this game into another messy affair lacking style for lengthy periods. Thankfully one thing we also brought forward was a clean sheet. Apparently that's the first time under Joe Royle we've had 2 in a row. Hard to believe at first, but when you think about it...

Shefki was the star of the show today, and broke the deadlock just before half time with a superb 30 yard thunderbolt. Super Jim, starting his first league match this season, squared the ball to him and he just let fly.

It wasn't long after the restart when he doubled the lead, slightly less spectacularly this time but it was a kick-in-the-teeth for Rotherham and they never got back into the match. They did have their chances though, and Kelvin Davis was kept active late on pulling off some good saves.

The defence was together today, which was probably the best thing about the match apart from that great goal. Lets hope we can put a lengthy run of 3 clean sheets together with a win against the Wolves on Monday.

Not the most glamorous of ties, not the most important competition in the footballing calendar, and so a chance for Joe to experiment a little by blooding a couple more youngsters. Two new Scotts, Barron and Mitchell started tonight, with a combined age of about 7, and Lewis Price was the man between the jumpers.

It was great to see another youngster back in the side for the first time this season, Jim Magilton lasting for an hour before being withdrawn with no apparent injury.

The game got off to a decent enough start, but the chances that Town had were not converted despite Brentford not being the sharpest at the back, and it deteriorated from there. The visitors found their legs, or rather they probably felt luck was on their side, and pressed occasionally themselves, but also with no score.

Without being that poor the game was uninteresting and un-noteworthy, what more can I say? Not much - ah yes, the eventual goals.

Tommy Miller opened proceedings with a fortuitous goal, his shot looping up off a defender leaving the 'keeper stranded. They all count - well, apart from the early effort by Pablo that was ruled out for pushing.

The second came as the Bees pushed for a late equaliser, all players including their goalie up in the Town half for a set piece. Lewis Price collected the ball and showed great awareness to quickly kick out, the ball heading for goal where Westlake helped it into the net. Was it going in? That would've been some debut.

We were all keen to get back to winning ways and I for one thought that Cardiff were less than ideal opponents in that situation, usually making us work hard for anything and the memory of the final game of last season still fresh - they gave us a scare then.

Bent and Bowditch started with Kuqi, and bright they looked too when the game was allowed to flow. It seemed that we'd got "one of those" ref's, and that he was keen to use his whistle at any opportunity and wouldn't let the game develop.

The opening 20 minutes seemed to last forever, nothing memorable happened although Naylor and Horlock would probably disagree as they both got on the wrong end of some brutal clashes to get bloody noses. They both were forced to change blood-stained shirt for fresh, blank ones.

Cardiff always bring a vocal support on the long trip from Wales and this was no exception, what they lacked in number they made up for in voice. It seemed they were lifting their team after some Town pressure, but thankfully it was us who made the breakthrough.

It was Darren Bent who broke the deadlock, hitting an early shot past the 'keeper at the near post after a good run on the right. With this the game sparked into life.

After half time the game resumed in a similar fashion, Cardiff battling and harrassing, but Town easing into their passing game.

Despite starting to get on top of the match, we managed to gift Cardiff the equaliser early on, Naylor giving a short backpass that Lee still had to do well from to score.

Calm heads kept on passing, but the second goal didn't come until Pablo was introduced for Shefki. The Spaniard was to have a hand in the 2nd goal for Town, as he wriggled through the defence to put a wide ball to Deano, who carefully picked out an advancing Tommy Miller on the edge of the box. He lashed to ball home and scored probably the best goal of the afternoon.

Counago was having a good game, but unfortunately missed a great chance to make it 3. Bent raced forward and rounded the goalie but with the angle too acute, he passed back to Pablo unmarked 10 yards out. Unfortunately there followed a comedy / Row Z moment that he'd rather forget. Not a reflection on his performance though.

Thankfully the 3rd goal did come from Ian Westlake, and cleverly worked too from Bent who picked him out on the edge of the box, and he showed Pablo how it's done.

A well deserved 3 points and some good individual performance as well as the team display. Jason De Vos showed no sign of his phantom leg break, and did well against 2 good strikers, in fact I hardly noticed Rob Earnshaw all afternoon.

I'd have to agree with Joe on this one - definitely the poorest we've played in a long while. Unless you count the very poor spells we had in either half at Forest of course.

Town simply weren't at the races at Derby. I was expecting them to be hungry for their first win, as by all account their previous 2 defeats had been somewhat unjust. They weren't brilliant, but easily better than us.

The Ipswich midfield seems totally out of shape at times, perhaps we are indeed missing Jim Magilton as many say (we shall see upon his return, but you can guarantee that plenty of those same people will be moaning about him anyway!).

One thing that struck me as strange was that Drissa Diallo stayed on the pitch for the entire 90. He was arguably responsible for 2 of the goals conceded, and was getting torn apart, caught napping, chasing the ball, all those things throughout the game. I'm all for showing faith in players but I couldn't understand the substitutions at all. Taking off Bowditch and Richards reduced us to the same team that played so badly in Nottingham midweek. Wilnis must be prefered to Diallo now, surely?

Not that Diallo is to blame for the defeat though, there were few players in the Town team at their best out on the pitch. Jason de Vos was an exception, he's looking solid at the back, more so each game. He's vocal too and a worthy stand-in captain, I hope he doesn't suffer through jetting off to Canada for his international match. That goes for the other 4 on international duty this week too.

The long ball was in flight today again, not as much as midweek, but JR can't deny it's there, can he? We must be going for the "longest average pass" record this season, and if we keep leaking goals again, we certainly won't be winning the highest average attendance.

I always have a bad feeling about going to Forest these days, its always a bit of a Bermuda triangle with regard to our form which seems to get left in the dressing room. A slight feeling of optimism that had this time developed pre-match, proved to be wind.

It promised to be a good game early on with chances for both sides, or at least we managed a reasonable share of possession. Dinning looked to be getting stuck in even if he wasn't match fit, and I was impressed with the "new" Drissa Diallo. The latter got forward well down the right and at times seemed to never stop chasing the ball down - "terrier like" I suppose a pundit might say. He is certainly not his last season's timid self.

Something changed, at the point when Kelvin Davis made his first fantastic save of the afternoon. The header from only 6 yards by Taylor was powerful, on target and not of the usual straight-at-the-keeper type. I wasn't alone in jumping to my feet to applaud the wonderful reaction save.

Forest got a sniff of it though and tails up, piled on pressure which brought the opener. Not before Davis had made another good stop though, this time the ball unfortunately falling to the feet of Evans who followed up in the area you'd expect the Town defence to be in.

Shefki was putting in the effort, although his game wasn't falling into place and he was trying some fancy stuff when the basics seemed to be failing. Creativity is a good thing, but he was a bit Salvador Dali at times, he and Bent never seemed to get an understanding on the night and the odd back-heel or flick-on seemed all too easily intercepted. That said, the Forest defence were pretty tight considering their injuries and suspensions in that area, and made it hard for the Town front pair.

Most expected changes at half time but Joe Royle stuck with the same line-up, and once again as in the first half they started brightly. Town won a corner which Miller delivered well into the nearside of the box for Naylor, who headed on across to find Bent who fired the ball home from close range. The script may well have read that Town, confidence regained then went on to dominate. But unfortunately not.

Forest reacted well and soon after set off on a period of pressure that was rarely checked. They hit the woodwork at least 3 times and the ball was in the Ipswich area for an obscene amount of time. It not good for the fans, having to watch that sort of barrage.

Thankfully their second never came, largely thanks to Davis again. Man of the Match to you, Sir. In fact just like last season, the Tractor Boys did have chances to steal all 3 points late on, but it would've been stealing. Notably Bent's last chance was presented to him by Taylor, who dumfounded fans home and away alike, when he chose not to leave a floated free-kick from Tommy Miller to sail harmlessly out of play near goal, but to head it powerfully [again] back across goal. Only a very messy and dubious challenge stopped Bent scoring. Needless to say Taylor's team mates "questioned" him on his decision.

The late, very late introduction of Dean Bowditch salvaged a brief period of spirit, but probably only served in staving off the Forest threat. Why so late anyway? Was Joe hiding him from somebody?

Being practical a point was good from Forest away, and we're still joint top on points!

The first fixture is an important game for every team in the league, all keen to get off to a winning start. It did look for a while in the first half though, that it would be business as usual for Town, who fell behind after having numerous good chances to open the scoring themselves.

The game had started with a totally expected piece of behaviour from less than pretty Iwan Roberts, making the upwards move to Gillingham in the summer and heading their attack today. It only took 20 seconds of match play before he fouled Drissa Diallo, and was duly booked for his troubles. You can take the player out of Norwich, but you can't...

Sloppy defending lead to the Gills goal, to us in the stand it looked obvious where the cross was going to go, but it's not that easy I suppose, when you're out there on the pitch. Especially when you're running at full pelt in the intense heat of a 90°+ afternoon, so i'll let them off that one.

Town seemed to remain calm, and kept working at Gillingham in the same fashion, passing well and creating chances. No one pressed the panic button, a trait that has hopefully been consigned to last season's list of bad habits. The equaliser came before half time, and it was the ever positionally confused Richard Naylor who got himself in the mix to power home a brave header from a Kevin Horlock corner.

The second half was better from Ipswich. They dominated for long periods, although still looked susceptible on the break. In fact Kelvin Davis was called into action far too many times, and kept Town in the game with some outstanding saves on a couple of occasions. Both teams chose to use up all their subs, not surprising given the heat.

We saw the now-skinhead Pablo Counago introduced, and although not his best performance he went close and hit the post. Tommy Miller, unlucky not to score in the first half, had a go at the woodwork late on too, but the game seemed destined to finish 2-1 (well, given last year's match I thought they'd nick it 3-2 right up until final whistle).

So, we got the start we wanted, along with only 5 other teams in "The Coca-Cola Football League Championship". Joint top on points at least, now we simply have to stay there until May.