Ipswich Town manager Kieran McKenna has spoken of comparisons between himself and Thomas Frank.

McKenna was asked if his career path could be similar to that of the Danish manager, who is in charge of Brentford.

As McKenna prepares to take on Frank and the Bees, he paid tribute to the highly-rated coach.

“I take it as a compliment because I think he’s a very good manager and a very nice man when I’ve met him before,” he told reporters.

“I think he has much better hair than me, so I have to look over and envy that side of it.

“I don’t know the details of how he works so well but I think he’s done a fantastic job with Brentford and over the last few years he’s shown his qualities as a manager and from everything I know and one of my best friends is his assistant (Claus Nørgaard), a very good man, who I think will take you far in life.

“He’s done a fantastic job. I didn’t know him before (he was at Brentford), but you can see from the job he did in the Championship and the way he established them in the Premier League is very, very difficult to do, so he’s completely clearly a top manager.

“They’ve developed again this season and he’s done a fantastic job. I’ve seen him say it before, so I don’t think it’s any secret, there are some really good things at Brentford from a cultural point of view, they’ve got some great advantages in the market from a data point of view which has been a big part of their success as well.

“But at the same time, even in an organization like that, you need a very, very good coach to be as competitive as they’ve been and he clearly is and I know he’s got a very good staff as well. They’ve done a good job but we have to find a way to beat them this weekend.”