The Official Norwich City Thread

[truck71]

Was a great match to listen to on the radio, I think you'll scrape it- the North East two won't do enough to help themselves.

[nicanary]

I had hoped for a point at Palace (they'd been going through a bad patch) and the full 3 points today. Some hope.

Anyone else got that horrible gut feeling.......?

[CooperD]

Sadly I think that was the pivotal result. Win and we would have had a bit of breathing space, lose and we are firmly in the brown and smelly stuff. With Villa gone it's looking like us and Newcastle for the other two spots. We just aren't good enough.

[nicanary]

Virtually every other Premiership club had comments added yesterday after the last match of the season. Except City. It's best summed up by that well-known phrase "nothing to see here".

[Monkeylegend]

There is certainly a distinct lack of commentary of any description on their website, not even an apology to their loyal fans who deserve better.

Ah well, onwards and downwards. I never did rate Ed Balls.

[darren f]

I think the lack of posts is due to the fact that many City fans had seen the results and form since Christmas and had (certainly in my case) slowly, sub-consciously accepted relegation as the most probable outcome.

But where to now? IMO the playing squad needs an overhaul. The core is that which has already done the promotion / relegation twice now, which suggests they are simply not good enough long term, with the added disadvantage they are now 4-5 years older. The new signings, with a couple of exceptions, simply have not worked. How many will now go, who knows? For sure the defence needs sorting, Martin, Bennett and Bassong all have a minimum of one costly mistake per game in them, which is not good enough for the Championship, let alone the PL. Ollsen and Klose look the business, but I expect both will go.

Whether there is the heart at board level to invest heavily for large-scale rebuilding in order to get back up again is another matter- Delia / MWJ's continual habit of 'celebrity' (...Ed Balls, really?) and/or family appointments at Chairman and Board level is not confidence inspiring at all. The loss of the most football- knowledgeable CEO we have ever had is another huge concern. A lot of difficult decisions need to be made this Summer, all of which could have a massive impact in which direction we go next season.

[castex]

You should have kept Chris Hughton. As should we.
See you next year.

[nicanary]

castex said:

You should have kept Chris Hughton. As should we.
See you next year.

Short of a miracle, he won't be in the Premiership next year. I suspect he's not ruthless enough to thrive in the top tier. Nice guy, and underrated, but he's only good enough for the Championship.

Nothing much wrong with Alex Neil, and he's learned from this season. A bit naive, but then you'd expect that. I agree that it's the defence that needs a clear-out - quite how we finished up with a bucket-load of Championship-quality strikers, and League One defenders has baffled me.The only way we could counter the goals leaked by mistakes, was to score even more, and that was never going to happen.

I resigned myself years ago to the fact that in this modern age of mega-money clubs, we're always going to be one of those up-one-season, down-the-next teams. Ignore the Foxes, that was a fluke unlikely to re-occur for some years to come. Fighting for Championship success is something we'll get used to as the norm.

[darren f]

Wes (... cracking goal), Brady and Olssen arguably the best 3 players on the pitch during IREvSWE. How the hell did we manage to get relegated last season

[andyjo1982]

darren f said:

Wes (... cracking goal), Brady and Olssen arguably the best 3 players on the pitch during IREvSWE. How the hell did we manage to get relegated last season

Fine goal from Wes, and the other 2 looked handy as well. Looks like Redmond is off to Southampton, be surprised if we can keep hold of both Olssen and Brady, especially if they get through to knockout stages. I know Olssen nearly left 18 months ago for Swansea.

Its all far too quiet for my liking at Norwich, whilst we still have a decent squad for the championship, and not many other signings have happenend for other clubs yet, but we need to make a couple of signings to improve our first eleven. Another CB to play alongside Klose is essential, and 2 more strikers.

[nicanary]

andyjo1982 said:

darren f said:

Wes (... cracking goal), Brady and Olssen arguably the best 3 players on the pitch during IREvSWE. How the hell did we manage to get relegated last season

Fine goal from Wes, and the other 2 looked handy as well. Looks like Redmond is off to Southampton, be surprised if we can keep hold of both Olssen and Brady, especially if they get through to knockout stages. I know Olssen nearly left 18 months ago for Swansea.

Its all far too quiet for my liking at Norwich, whilst we still have a decent squad for the championship, and not many other signings have happenend for other clubs yet, but we need to make a couple of signings to improve our first eleven. Another CB to play alongside Klose is essential, and 2 more strikers.

James Milner. He's the answer to everything, just ask Roy.

[andyjo1982]

The new 3rd kit is awful.

Some things are best left in the past.

[darren f]

andyjo1982 said:

The new 3rd kit is awful.

Some things are best left in the past.

Indeed, it's a a real stinker- which is a shame as the new home and 2nd kits (IMO) are really nice designs this time, a welcome change from last years monstrosities. Having said that the seagull-s**t new 3rd kit has got us in the national press, maybe that was the plan all along!

AN has been quoted as saying some work on new signings is on-going. McCormack as a potential CF has been rumoured (... no thanks, I'd rather we went for Assombalonga at Forest another we have linked with). I'd still like to see a new CB (or even two assuming If we fail to keep Klose) as let's face it, the selection we currently have are just too mistake prone. I don't think we've ever properly replaced Bradley Johnson either- his drive and goals from midfield were a factor in getting us promoted last time, something we may well miss this time around.

Edited by darren f on Saturday 23 July 17:02

[darren f]

Pre season friendly yesterday- at home to Hannover. And we were shocking - 3-0 down after 50 minutes, we got two back (... both sublime Wes Hoolahan finishes) and it finished 2-3 but it us getting back into it was more due to the Germans losing interest than us playing well. In the First Half we were all over the place defensively and had little or no attacking prowess. The rumour mill is bringing up the name of McCormack as coming in this week (£12m ) but pdq we need some more defensive expertise, especially at CH. IMO- anybody with pace or movement is going to destroy us this season. I know, I know, it's just a friendly etc. etc. and by nature I am a pessimist, but the portents did not look good.

[nicanary]

Noting that Declan Rudd was being loaned to Charlton, I checked the squad for this year and noticed that Michael McGovern had been signed. I live in Ulster and thought it would have been on the local news, so it came as a surprise.

He may be 32, but that's not an advanced age for a keeper. He was superb for NI in Euro 2016, and I joked at the time that maybe Neil would put in a bid, since there was the Accies connection. Good signing. Can't say the rest of them are...........

[CooperD]

I'm happy with a point against the old enemy. We have started quite well and are unbeaten after our first 4 games. I do feel we need another forward to keep the pressure on Jerome and maybe another defender. McGovern gives me more confidence in goal than Ruddy now.

[andyjo1982]

5 wins on the spin. On a mission now and go into 2 tricky away games against Newcastle and Wolves with nothing to fear.

Jacob Murphy been an absolute revelation for us this year, and Josh also doing well.

We seem to have such depth in the squad, would've liked another striker, but hopefully we can get through to Jan with what we've got. Jerome is running himself into the ground every game.

[darren f]

Yep, things seem to be going well, although as a colleague with blue and white tendencies said the other day we 'haven't played anybody any good yet'. I (begrudgingly) kind of agree, and the next 2 away games will be a true gauge of where we are.

And we do seem to be winning games whilst playing not that well- Burton, Cardiff and Wigan could all have embarrassed us at home, our defence still seems all over the place at times (Klose hasn't settled this season at all). But reading back above that seems to be 'situation normal' for NCFC, something we have to live with!

Agree with you Andy on strength in depth, not many Champ teams could go to Everton, make 7 changes and still put out a decent team to get a result, or continue to have their £8m record signing unable to get in the squad (... I still can't work that one out). Hopefully having back ups for all positions (assuming Olivera comes good at CF) will be significant later in the season. Plus there are rumours on other forums that the Murphlings are both about to sign new contracts, cracking news, they have been brilliant (esp Jacob). If only to protect their value should any PL clubs come sniffing around come January.

[CooperD]

After our last few results I have reached the conclusion that Alex Neil has taken us as far as he can and it's now time to change the manager. 5-0 against Brighton was bad but we have lost our last two home games and against Leeds we conceded another injury time losing goal. Our defence is shocking. I can't recall the last time we kept a clean sheet. The man did well for us two seasons ago to get us promoted but we got relegated straight away and are now in dangzer of dropping off the pace this season. I didn't think we would finish above Newcastle but given the squad we have, we should certainly be at least in the other promotion spot.

[nicanary]

CooperD said:

After our last few results I have reached the conclusion that Alex Neil has taken us as far as he can and it's now time to change the manager. 5-0 against Brighton was bad but we have lost our last two home games and against Leeds we conceded another injury time losing goal. Our defence is shocking. I can't recall the last time we kept a clean sheet. The man did well for us two seasons ago to get us promoted but we got relegated straight away and are now in dangzer of dropping off the pace this season. I didn't think we would finish above Newcastle but given the squad we have, we should certainly be at least in the other promotion spot.

Can't help but to agree with you. I think he's not capable of any more - he's working at his personal ceiling. Year after year we spend money on strikers who've failed elsewhere, and no attention is given to the defence (bar Klose) and it's really only League One standard. The only way to win matches is to hope we score more than we leak (sorry if that's a bit obvious!) but the roster of forwards who've been bought to take us to the promised land is just a litany of Z-listers.

There must be plenty of agents who hear of interest from City and say "who?". Let's face it, the club is not going to attract anyone of outstanding talent, either playing or coaching staff. Short of being bought by a Russian oligarch or Middle-Eastern royalty, we're never going to have the money it takes to attract the top players, nor will they want to come to the club unless it's managed by a big name. The most we can ever hope for is the pendulum "up one year, down the next" that we've become used to. I don't mind - I'm not a glory seeker. I would, however, like to see a more balanced approach to player purchase in future. Not "he once scored 2 goals for Crawley a couple of seasons ago".