Town Legends: Ted Phillips

Phillips spent a short time on loan at Stowmarket following his move to Portman Road before making his debut against Watford on 3rd March 1954.

He would score his first goal for Town in his next game which followed a month later against Crystal Palace before making two further apperances and scoring again against Northampton at Portman Road.

In his second full season at Town Phillips scored twice on the opening day against Hull City, however Town still lost to Hull 4-2 with Bob Crosbie scoring all four goals for the home side. Phillips would make 12 more apperances for Town that year, scoring 2 more goals.

1956/57 would be the season that Phillips made his mark however where he scored 41 goals in 41 league games for Town including hat-tricks against Reading, Shrewsbury, Watford, QPR and Sheffield United. The striker would score in 26 out of the 44 games he was involved with. Town would finish the year as Divison Three (South) Champions.

The following season did not prove to be so kind for Phillips however, after another impressive start, scoring 11 times in 9 games. Phillips was hit by injury, and would appear in just one game after Christmas in a season where Town beat Manchester United 2-0 in the FA Cup Fourth Round, which proved to be the Lancashire clubs last home game prior to the Munich air disaster.

Phillips again missed chunks of the 58/59 season, but new goal hero Ray Crawford scored 25 times in Ted's absence before becoming a partnership the following year scoring 42 times throughout the season between them as Town finished 11th in League Division Two.

The 1960/61 season brought the most explosive Ipswich Town striker partnership in the history of the club with Phillips (30) and Crawford (40) scoring 70 times in all competitions as Town Pipped Sheffield United to the post and won the English second Division by a single point, sending them back up to England's top flight.

It was to get better for Town and Phillips however, the following season Ted netted 28 times and Crawford 33 as Town achieved the amazing feet of winning the English Division One at the first time of asking following their promotion from Division Two, an achievement which virtually nobody thought was possible.

For Phillips however, the 61/62 season was to be his last at his prolific best. Over the next two seasons Phillips scored just 13 times in 55 league games, well short on his previous figures in his eight years at Town and as a consequence was made avaliable for transfer.

Phillips left Town after ten years for Leyton Oreient, staying a year scoring 8 times in 36 games. A short spell of 12 games scoring 8 goals at Luton followed before Phillips finished his career at Colchester, scoring 13 times in 32 games.