Have the cracks stared to appear for the first time in a longish while for the Canaries?
Not since that awful away defeat at Plymouth in only Glenn Roeder's third game in charge at Norwich have City looked as unconvincing as they did in the first-half on Saturday.
In fairness, it hasn't been the best couple of weeks for the Canaries.
There was the ?no show? ? as the City boss termed it – at Leicester, the hesitancy against Barnsley in the next game despite a victory being secured and then the lethargy at the weekend, and suddenly it's a different ball game now to not so long ago when the team were seemingly wracking up the points at will.
It is at this point that it would only be right to remind oneself that were are talking about a dip in what have usually been mightily impressive standards here when all is said and done, and certainly not the magnitude of incompetence delivered at places like Wolves and Queens Park Rangers under the previous regime earlier this term, as well as at Home Park for the first time under Roeder's leadership.
And we should also stop for a moment to remember if someone had been foolish enough to have offered us a fourth from bottom finish for Norwich at the end of the campaign before Roeder walked through the door at Carrow Road he'd have been knocked him over in the stampede, so any concerns of an inconsistent and ineffective Canaries at present must be put into perspective.
Nevertheless, City have certainly taken their foot off the gas in recent matches for some reason.
The absence of Darel Russell in midfield has shown in these last two matches, as while Fotheringham, Pattison and Gibbs have all added certain qualities to the engine room, none has provided the all-round game that Russell can usually be relied upon to deliver.
Decent goal-scoring chances have also been at a premium recently, as while we have witnessed an upping of the tempo in spells in each of these last three matches and fleeting moments of quality that have promised that City might be finally about to shift into gear, at no time has it been a case of the Canaries battering down the door of the opposition goalmouth like in some games during the thirteen game unbeaten run… Leicester at home and Barnsley away, for example.
It'll certainly be interesting therefore to see how or if Norwich can respond to this mini blip.
One thing that is for sure though, is that if opponents Watford perform to anything approaching their own usual standards then City will unquestionably be up against it again.
The Hornets are set to fight it out it seems with Stoke, Bristol City and West Brom for one of the two automatic promotion places over the next few weeks, and will fancy their chances of making a swift return to the top flight after their relegation from the Premier League last term.
Vicarage Road has become a difficult place to go to in order to try to secure a result since Aidy Boothroyd joined the club almost three years ago, although they have shown an uncharacteristic vulnerability on their own patch this season by only winning seven of their 17 home games to date, and have basically put themselves in a position for promotion largely thanks to their away form.
That is something that the Canaries can focus on and try to exploit, but they need to get their own act together first and foremost and aim to recapture the attacking impetus and defensive steadfastness that has largely been responsible for them rocketing up the Coca-Cola Championship table in the last four months, but which has worryingly been missing recently.
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