The Official Norwich City Thread
Discussion
CooperD said:
Time is definitely up for Alex Neil. I don't think he can turn around the club and I hope he resigns on Monday. A season of mid table mediocrity or worse is on he horizon.
You may well be right. But I feel sorry for AN- working under a Board of Directors that do not want the business to progress (... did you see Delia Smith's Times interview?). How motivated would that make you and your players / co-workers? Whilst a failed politician / celebrity dancing national laughing-stock gets voted in as Chairman and 'Nephew Tom' (zero business experience but is the 'long term future of the Club') gets voted onto the Board. NCFC is really in a sorry mess just now- I get the impression that McNally was the football expertise at the Club for so long, now he has gone we are going to revert to the 'little old Norwich' mindset- this is very apparent from the Times interview. IMO the future promotion / relegation cycle for us is more likely to be Championship / D1 than PL / Championship. Raygun said:
Blimey Norwich fans you lose a few games and it's 'Get rid of the manager' you did the same thing with Chris Houghton who's doing quite nicely at Brighton now. If you've got any axe to grind aim it at the board for not paying players like Redmond what he wanted.
Hughton is a great championship manager- I'd love him to be at NCFC right now. But as Newcastle and we found out, at PL level his favoured tactic is 'try to draw or if not try to lose by the minimum amount possible'. Which simply does not endear him to the fans. IMO he will get Brighton up this season, but will have to change his usual way of setting up teams up in the PL for them to stay up. Yes there is lots of noise from fans about our manager- but it's the old issue, he is the easy target as it's easier to sack one guy rather than 11+ players or the Board of Directors. But there will be major ructions ahead about the lack of ambition from Delia Smith and the Board- your comment about Redmond is relevant, there is going to be minimal commitment to keep quality players at the club (or bring any in), there simply isn't the financial clout available to do so, nor is there commitment to allow anyone from outside to bring in investment. As an aside we were never going to keep Redmond anyway- he is a quality player that needed proper coaching to progress- he was never going to get that at Norwich (... top level coaching is something else we have never paid for).
Edited by darren f on Sunday 27th November 15:51
Raygun said:
Blimey Norwich fans you lose a few games and it's 'Get rid of the manager' you did the same thing with Chris Houghton who's doing quite nicely at Brighton now. If you've got any axe to grind aim it at the board for not paying players like Redmond what he wanted.
Hughton was responsible for us being relegated and should have been fired sooner. Brighton are in the Championship, there are plenty of managers who've proven themselves effective in that league but not the Prem (Warnock for example).It's not just a few games, we've lost 6 on the bounce and haven't done that in over 15 years - in that time we've had much worse sides relative to our opponents than we do now
nicanary said:
Played well enough in Euro 2016. Likes attacking, not so good at defending.
This is the bit I was worried about - as much as we are poor going forward, we are even worse defensively and having a back four who's number one skill is keeping clean sheets is an absolute priority.Timbo_S2 said:
Legend83 said:
Apparently we (the Swans) have signed Martin Olsson for £5m.
Good player?
One of the best players we have had for the past few years. consistently top three.Good player?
(I don't know how old Legend83 is, but he may need to look up Mr. Forbes on Wiki - they don't make 'em like that any more, and some would say for the better ).
Olssen at £4m (as rumoured) is a steal, Another player we plainly managed not to get the best out of. Meanwhile we are potentially shipping out Brady in this window, the only other possible 'real' LB we have, having only last week loaned out young Toffolo for the season. If Brady stays we'll be keeping a player who obviously doesn't want to be here, Another 'lash up' in this season of unremitting p***-poor management. We really are in an almighty mess, as is befitting of a Club whose majoity shareholder's ambition extends no further than mid-table Championship (at best).
Monkeylegend said:
Lasted a bit longer than he probably should have, will need a miracle now to reach the playoffs.
Hardly a surprising development. He worked wonders at Hamilton, but that's a mickey-mouse league compared to the intensity and challenge of English higher divisions. I think he was out of his depth, but I reckon he'll bounce back in the future.Even without Redmond and Brady it was still a strong squad and it amazes me how much of a problem they had coping with the likes of Rotherham, Wigan, Burton etc..Not good enough and we finish almost certainly in mid-table obscurity. I'm not in favour of sacking managers without giving them a chance but it's probably the right decision.
I have to say that anything our board does doesn't surprise me any more.The timing of the announcement is very strange though. Alex Neil gives a pre match press conference at 2 pm and four hours later he is sacked. I don't know why they didn't give him the bullet after the Bristol City game. I certainly think that AN did very well in his first year at the club with our promotion but the latter half of our Premiership season was poor as seen by our relegation and possibly he should have gone after that season but the board presumably thought he could get us back up. We were second favourites to get promotion according to all the bookies and the season started well but after the Newcastle result when we lead 4-3 with 2 minutes left and lost the team went downhill rapidly. The board had numerous times to put things right but the problems at Norwich go much deeper than just sacking the manager. I think time is up for Delia and co and she she should consider selling up. She appears to have alienated most fans and as for putting her nephew on the board. That just smacks of nepotism. Who would I like to see in as the next manager? Gary Rowett would be my choice. Has good experience of the Championship and was doing very well at Birmingham until his rather strange sacking and see what has happened to them since he left.
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