Ipswich Town assistant manager Martyn Pert insists Kyle Edwards did 'nothing wrong' after the winger was shown an early red card in tonight's 1-0 defeat at Cambridge United in the Papa John's Trophy.

Edwards was shown two yellow cards inside the opening 17 minutes, the second for alleged simulation, and the 10-man Blues eventually cracked when Lewis Simper scored a 79th minute winner.

"The first one he's knocked it over the boy's head with a lovely bit of skill, then it's a bit of a high foot so, yeah, I'll take that yellow card," said Pert.

"The second one... It's a nice little overlap, he's got the one-v-one, he's gone past him and, I've seen it on the video, he has clipped him. I don't know whether it was inside or outside the box, but he's fouled him. He's not dived.

"It destroyed the way the game was going for us because we had complete domination of the game. It was looking a good game for our young players because they could have got a lot from it. But then they had to react and deal with us having 10 men for 70 minutes.

"Overall it's positives. We're still top of the group and it was good minutes for the lads."

Blues boss Kieran McKenna marched straight up to referee Thomas Parson to voice his frustrations at half-time, with Pert and first team coach Charlie Turnbull also having their say.

"I haven't spoke to the referee about it and it's probably best not to really.," said Pert.

"I just couldn't believe it. It is what it is, I suppose. He just didn't need to make the decision. You can always go by players' reactions and no-one was going 'he's dived!' Fine, don't give the penalty, don't give a foul, just let it go out of play and keep the game going.

"It's a big shame for Kyle because he's had spells in games where he's done really well. He was hoping to get some more good minutes today and have some positive contributions going forwards. He'll be disappointed, but he hasn't done anything wrong."

Despite Ipswich going into this match virtually guaranteed of progress to the knockout stages, and having a big League One clash with Derby County coming up on Friday night, McKenna picked a very strong team full of senior players.

"We did play three teenagers (Cameron Humphreys, Edwin Agbaje and Tawanda Chirewa) and I always think it's better to give them a chance by putting them in a proper team," explained Pert.

"It allows it to be a proper game for them to come into and get a proper feel of professional level football rather than putting all the young lads in at the same time.

"They're playing with Richard Keogh, who's played in the last 16 of the Euros, they're playing with Lee Evans... The football's proper isn't it?"

He added: "When you're in that robustness of playing games you just want to keep playing. Sometimes these are as good as, if not better than, training sessions."