Ipswich go to Nottingham Forest on Monday night for their fifth round tie.
“I think it’s a welcome distraction,” said McKenna. “If we’re completely honest, in terms of league action, we’d rather not play them Monday night because you’d rather have the full week build-up and prep for the Crystal Palace game. So we’d rather have had one of the earlier fixtures in terms of our Premier League preparation.
“But there haven’t been as many games this season as we’re used to and enjoy, so I’d rather not be facing 10 days without a game, I’d rather have a chance to play a game, test ourselves again against another Premier League team, utilise our squad, get minutes into those who need and deserve them, but also give ourselves a chance to be competitive and try and go through in the game. For us, it’s a welcome distraction at the moment.”
McKenna also said: “It’s been important.
“I’ve said it before, it’s important how we work. We really try and keep two players for each position physically and technically and tactically ready, and that’s helped us over the course of our journey to this point.
“Having that has been important and part of that is utilising the squad in the cup competitions, and we’ve done it up until this point and the players have done really well.
“Of course, we haven’t made any decisions for Monday night yet, but there’s a chance that some of those who have done really well in the first two rounds will get an opportunity again and hopefully we can get another strong performance.”