Dave Jones predicts Ipswich Town will stay up as his opposite number decides how to replace a man like Leadbitter

Owen Garvan or Jack Colback will be tasked with the considerable job of replacing Grant Leadbitter in Ipswich Town’s midfield for tonight’s encounter with Cardiff City.

Roy Keane must decide who is best suited to replace the suspended Leadbitter and line up alongside David Norris in the centre of the park. Some disgruntled Town fans have questioned the lack of creativity within Town’s midfield recently and both Garvan and Colback offer something different.

The Irishman still has many fans within Portman Road and supporters would be right behind him as he looked to pick passes and unlock Cardiff’s defence. While Colback has impressed everyone in the last few months with his great engine and ability to push forward and break beyond the Town strikers. Both men would offer something different to Norris and both could actually start with one in the centre of midfield and one on the left.

With Garvan never looking completely comfortable when out wide, often exposed by his lack of place, it would make sense for the Republic of Ireland Under 21 captain to start in the centre. This would give Keane a decision whether to put Colback to the left of Garvan or play him at left-back and push Jaime Peters more forward. Peters grew into Saturday’s game at Blackpool and was at the heart of a number of good moves, not least providing the cross for Jon Walters to head against the Pool crossbar in injury time. But many feel Colback’s attacking instincts are stunted in the full-back position and Keane’s decisions will, as ever, be heavily scrutinised.

Elsewhere, there are other big calls to be made as Town look to quickly overcome the weekend’s disappointment which now sees them just a point from safety. Centre back pairing Gareth McAuley and Damien Delaney – who were labelled ‘the Twin Towers’ by Blackpool boss Ian Holloway – passed their race to be fit for Saturday’s match.

With little over three days between the matches, the duo would have had little time to recover before facing 27-goal strike partnership, Jay Bothroyd and Michael Chopra. Both defenders will probably start again but one wonders how the bodies of McAuley and Delaney can handle such a rigorous programme of fixtures.

If three of the midfield spots are potentially tied up, the identity of the right midfielder is less clear. Much will depend on where Keane opts to start his captain Jon Walters. By his usual high standards, the skipper has been slightly underperforming since coming back from injury and he will need a big game in the absence of fellow leader, Leadbitter, who also misses Saturday’s crucial home match against Scunthorpe. Carlos Edwards and Lee Martin will be fighting it out for a position on the right if Keane opts to start Walters upfront.

One almost certain certainty among the top two is David Healy who cleared impressed his manager when he came on against Blackpool. Healy spurned a good chance from 12 yards but also brought the best out of home keeper Matthew Gilks with an instinctive header that looked destined for the far post.

Although he praised the impact of fellow subs – and strikers – Pablo Counago and Connor Wickham, Keane gave a special word to Healy and suggested the Northern Irishman might now benefit from a run of games. If so, the manager will have to decide who is best to partner Healy, with Daryl Murphy not quite living up to his early billing and Counago not impressing in recent matches when he has started. Keane also suggested that Wickham is currently more of an impact player which means the teenager will have to continue to do his work from the bench.

Not possessing the largest squad in the Championship, Cardiff boss Dave Jones has seen his team decimated with no less than nine first teamers out injured or, in the case of Ricky Scimeca, retired. Championship leading goalscorer, Peter Whittingham, and one-time Premiership full-back Mark Kennedy are the latest to enter the treatment room and both are expected to miss out at Portman Road.

Away from his own worries, City boss Dave Jones had some words of encouragement for Roy Keane and his side.

Jones told Cardiff’s official website: “”Roy is a doing a good job and will turn Ipswich around just as he did at Sunderland. Ipswich are good enough to stay up. They are a fantastic football club with a good manager. They have some good players. Sometimes you go through a season where you think everything is in place and all of a sudden it doesn’t work out as you’d like.

“Ipswich aren’t doing as well as they expected, but in their case they brought in a new manager, new players came in and had to bed in. There were high expectation levels, but things don’t happen overnight. When Roy went in, everybody assumed that was it, crash bang wallop, here we go, we’re going to be fantastic. You’ve still got to earn the right, and get the right players, and that takes time. He’s basically on the first rung of that ladder.”

My Ipswich Town team: Murphy (B), Rosenior, McAuley, Delaney, Peters, Walters, Norris, Garvan, Colback, Healy, Murphy (D).

Prediction: Without meaning to copy Roy Keane and sound like a “stuck record” or star in Groundhog Day, I am going to once again plump for 1-1, a result which would equal the club record for draws in a season. Fresh from the hurt at Blackpool, I can see a similar showing to the one displayed against West Brom last month. I will get braver, honest.

* For all the latest Ipswich Town news at Portman Road tonight, and every day, follow my Twitter feed at http://twitter.com/davegoods.