Ipswich Town has been promoted to the Premier League after a 22-year absence from top-flight football.

The Tractor Boys beat Huddersfield 2-0 to confirm promotion by finishing at the top of the Championship table.

And it has been a long time coming.

The team was relegated on May 11, 2002 after a 5-0 defeat by Liverpool at Anfield.

The automatic promotion in the 2023/2024 Championship season under manager Kieran McKenna makes Ipswich Town the first side since Southampton in 2012 to achieve back-to-back promotions.

This was after Ipswich Town, at one point, was relegated to the third tier League One after the 2018/2019 season.

The team finished at the bottom of the Championship table to get relegated that year.

It marked the end of a 63-year run in the top two tiers of English football.

A bit of history

Ipswich Town's departure from the Premier League two decades ago was incredible considering that the team was competing with Leeds and Liverpool for the last remaining Champions League spot.

Prior to being relegated, the team finished fifth-place in 2001.

With Champions League hopes dashed, the team was still looking at qualification for the UEFA Cup followed.

Ipswich even shocked Inter Milan, beating them 1-0 at home at Portman Road in the first leg of a third-round tie before the Italian giants later prevailed at the San Siro.

Second season syndrome

However, "second season syndrome" kicked in and Ipswich saw just nine league wins and four points short of safety to remain in the league.

Troubles on the pitch were just the start.

Could not afford to keep team together

Ipswich subsequently went into administration and all hopes of a quick return to the Premier League were dashed as key players had to be sold in a fire sale.

The team were subsequently denied promotion twice in the Championship play-off semi-finals for two consecutive seasons.

At one point, Manchester United legend Roy Keane took up managerial duties in the spring of 2009, but was unable to replicate the formula that had produced an immediate Championship promotion-winning campaign at Sunderland.

Keane's tenure lasted less than two years.

Multiple managers then came and left and failed to bring the team back to the top league.

And then things got worse.

Relegated to League One

For the first time since 1957, Ipswich began the 2019/20 season in English football's third tier.

But things started to turn around when U.S.-based consortium Gamechanger 20 pulled off a reported £40m takeover in April 2021.

The team could start buying more players and lift itself up from mid-table obscurity.

McKenna to the rescue

On Dec. 16, 2021 Ipswich confirmed that 35-year-old Manchester United assistant manager McKenna had been appointed the new manager on a three-and-a-half year contract.

The soft-spoken McKenna, an unknown at that time, had worked under Jose Mourinho, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Ralph Rangnick at Old Trafford alongside Michael Carrick.His odds of making it were as unfancied as the many managers before him.

The timing of his arrival could not have been more ominous: League Two club Barrow had just knocked Ipswich Town out of the FA Cup second round in December 2021, days before the new manager came on board.

But McKenna's magic on the pitch started to show in his first full season in charge.

His team amassed 98 points to finish in second place in 2022/2023 League One season and was granted automatic promotion back to the Championship after a four-year absence.

New manager and back to second-tier football was how the fairytale started.

Now, 46 games later, Ipswich Town is back to the top flight following a season of free-scoring, free-flowing football in the Championship.

Top phot via Ipswich Town