That we have all become die-hard Baggies for the day speaks volumes.
So too the fact that, from the most wretched of seasons, it all boils down to a shoot-out that is happening over 250 miles away and over which which we have no control whatsoever.
And with a bore draw suiting both teams perfectly it is sufficient to make the stomach churn… and has.
My own coping mechanism is one of assuming the worst while hoping for the best. Twitter is full of folk telling us to ‘#ncfc #believe’ and I applaud the sentiment and their optimism. I’ve tried – believe me I have – but for the last six months I have been doing just that and look where it has taken us.
No, I’m afraid the time for blind faith is almost over. My unbridled and unswerving faith in the Class of 2014 has almost been broken.
Sunday was good of course, and there is no denying that had that result been acquired early or mid-season we’d have been purring all the way to mid-table, but in the circumstances an unbelievably well and hard-earned goalless draw felt like a defeat.
Yes, they delivered at the Bridge but for most of these horrific final few months of the season they’ve come up short – often by some distance. And that’s why we find ourselves in the ridiculous position of kidding ourselves that a Sunderland side who are unbeaten in four, including away wins at Chelsea and Manchester United, are about to implode.
That they have another home game – against Swansea – at the weekend makes it all the more implausible.
So, while there is probably two or three percent of me left dreaming the dream, the rest is already preparing for life in the Championship. That fearful place that Paul Lambert and David McNally treated with such wonderful contempt four long seasons ago.
It goes without saying that once our fate is decided (10pm this evening?) the inquest will begin in earnest, with the opening shots having already been fired… some in the direction of this website!
The decision by the Board to keep faith with Chris Hughton will clearly be at the forefront of the debate, but so too the dealings in the January transfer window.
With the benefit of hindsight, to have emerged from the mid-season free-for-all with a 33 year-old central defender and a 30 year-old, injury prone, left-winger when the team was crying, yelling and screaming out for someone to put the ball in the net was a mis-judgement of the highest order.
It is well known that McNally is no lover of the January window and its failure to deliver value for money, but a costly gamble may have been sufficient to score us another six goals.
A costly gamble versus missing out on the BT Sport 2014/15 cash bonanza? No contest.
But, for whatever reason, it didn’t happen and the decision makers are now left with nothing but to lick their wounds.
Hindsight is wonderful isn’t it? As disappointed as we all were that Jim White wasn’t able to introduce a sensational ‘Sky Sports understands…’ moment for us, few bemoaned the two signings that did arrive; most in fact agreeing that Jonas Guttierez would add some much needed quality from wide areas, in the absence of the injured Anthony Pilkington and Elliott Bennett.
That said Argentinian has spent most of his time on the Colney (or perhaps Darsley Park) treatment table says much about how unkind the footballing gods have been to us. If it could go wrong it probably has, which is par for the course when on a downward and uncontrollable spiral.
But too many ifs and buts.
Looking back, too many decisions made over the last year have been the wrong ones but, in reality, how many of us would have done it too much differently?
From the comfort of a keyboard we all know better than those charged with doing it for real, but only David, Delia, Michael and co carry the weight of expectation of the Canary Nation.
In hindsight, those who called for the head of Chris Hughton in December will consider their campaign to have been vindicated, but the decision to retain his services was made in good faith on the basis that a league position that hovered around fourteenth place could be maintained.
Ultimately, we all want what’s best for Norwich City Football Club of course – that much we do have in common – but there are more than 30,000 different views on how it can be best achieved.
Assuming the worst happens – either later today or on Sunday – there are some big calls to be made by those in power. Both for their own futures and the futures of others. Personally, I’m hoping for no change at the top table but we’ll see…
For now, let’s keep everything crossed for a miracle. They do happen. Ipswich almost made the play-offs.
“Looking back, too many decisions made over the last year have been the wrong ones but, in reality, how many of us would have done it too much differently?”
Me!
Hughton would have been sent politely packing last year if I was McNally. A prem standard manager would not have allowed our abysmal run from Jan to May. While I was swept up in the summer signings and had belief we’d do better this year, it was clear as early as Oct that things hadn’t changed in the slightest. That was chance two. The last was in Jan with the poor performances to teams around us and the window opening up. We played Hughton chicken three times and lost each one.
As you say, hindsight is a wonderful thing, but it has nothing on foresight. I criticized the Jan transfers only to be told on Twitter…
From @RossiHutch “@iamdavebowers we are near yhe relegation due to a lack of experience which we have brought in with yobo and jonas! Are you blind or stupid?”
My eyesight is perfect, so I must have been stupid.
While I don’t want any change of the board, or perhaps the manager, there are a lot of hard lessons to be learned here. For example, budgeting for 16th doesn’t mean finishing 16th, it also doesn’t fit with the continuous improvement over 11th. Another, doing everything to be debt free as fast as possible can also put you back into debt just as quickly too. We now have prem expenses in the championship , so unless we escape in one season or two, we’ll be back in the red (or will have sold off nearly our whole squad).
Sometimes you have to spend an extra 10m not to lose 40m. In January we didn’t want to do that.
“In hindsight, those who called for the head of Chris Hughton in December will consider their campaign to have been vindicated”
I don’t. It would have been vindicated if we removed Hughton and saw an improvement in performances, goals, and points. I personally see the last year as a harsh lesson in hope vs. reality, with reality winning. I’m sure others see differently.
Thanks Dave. As ever you’ve made your points well and with eloquence. Hard to disagree with anything you’ve said or the flaws you’ve found in my blog.
But – like I said – while we all desperately want the same thing, we all visualise a different route to achieve it. More often than not it seems I call it wrong, but always with the best intentions.
Fingers crossed for a miracle!
(1) I think even that great football pundit Nostradamus would be a touch embarrassed to claim the amount of ‘foresight’ that you modestly set out.
You’ve had a pathological dislike for Hughton and his methods from way back – any ‘predictions’ of relegation this season were borne more out of a desperate wish to be proved personally right than anything else.
The style wasn’t great but up to about 4 weeks ago we weren’t (and hadn’t been) in any danger of the drop – a combination of collective poor form and missed opportunities (Cardiff, West Ham and Fulham away games for example) over the past 4-6 weeks have done for us along with Connor Wickham suddenly becoming the best striker in the PL! No one, not even you, could have had the foresight to have seen that coming.
Adams gave it a good go but I still believe it was wrong to sack Hughton when we did – it can’t be proved but he would have kept us up..then would have been the time to make a change.
Sorry Bruce but have to disagree. If you look at our results for each month since the start of the season, never in any month have we outperformed relative to a sensible target to finish mid table. The writing was on the wall as long ago as Hull away and Villa at home, the last 4 to 6 weeks merely confirmed that since those early season misadventures nothing had improved and the distinct sounds of chickens coming home to roost were growing ever louder. In my view by the measure of results against the teams we needed results against we simply weren’t doing what we needed to avoid relegation. The fact that we were a few points above the bottom 3 was always going to be misleading. I can’t recall exactly when the MOTD pundits predicted us to go down, but is was many many weeks ago – it has irritated me ever since but it’s been hard to deny the truth of it.
@3 Bruce
You are of course entitled to your opinions, as am I. I believe I and many others could see the direction our club were headed and didn’t like it. Many predicted relegation. Just go back into the comments of popular NCFC websites at around Christmas and you’ll see many comments predicting events that have come to pass.
Back in Dec. this site published an article with this quote from me…
“On one hand under Hughton we finished a respectable 11th with 44 points last season, we are without debt, and spent big in the summer attracting a lot of top talent. On the other hand, in 2013 we have witnessed our team’s playing style deteriorate, performances against the big teams turn from competitive matches to roll-overs, and we sit just 3 points above the relegation zone.”
Everyone knew that going into the last four games we would need a good distance between ourselves and relegation. I’ve always said it doesn’t matter what others do, all that matters is our pts. vs 18th. Three points were never going to cut it. Yes, we’ve opened that gap at times, but never convincingly. One key factor has been that many teams beneath us always had 2-3 games in hand. Many people ignored those, and to our peril. If you looked at the league with all those games having been won then we’ve been in the relegation zone for some time.
I think we’re already illustrating Gary’s point that there’ll be plenty of arguments!
Dave: you deserve credit for consistency, but I’m afraid not for much else. Your last point sounds impressive but doesn’t stand up to any scrunity. At the end of January, for instance, we were 13-14th. How many games did others have in hand on us? Zero.
Chris(4) – writing on the wall after the Hull game? Second game of the season! It was a freak set of circumstances to boot in that one (dodgy pen/early sending off/home bus parked for over an hour). We did win at Stoke and West Brom before the turn of the year.
Dave(5) – note you didn’t deny the “pathological dislike” tag! Of course we’d all like our team to show a nice simple linear progression year after year in the league but in reality that’s fantasy land – for a club of our size, it’s always going to be a yo-yo effect in the top league. Stoke under ‘golden balls’ Pulis in 5 seasons in the PL ‘only’ finished as high as 11th (2nd season).
Do you think Neil is the man to take us forward?
Well,praying hasn’t worked then. See you at Elland Road next season. How much did you pay for Becchio again? Not laughing now are you?
I agree that that many of us could see relegation as a distinct possibility many months ago. For me though the underlying reason wasn’t Hughton per se but the lack of quality in the squad, especially on the ball.
I don’t believe we would be staying up had we changed managers mid-stream, except possibly by beating Palace to sign Pulis (assuming he would have come to us).
And would I prefer to be in the Premiership next season but stuck fighting relegation with Tony P for a couple of years? I know some Stoke fans and I’m not sure I would. Depends who we get instead though.
January’s transfer window was never going to solve our problems. Our midfield are not skilled enough to hold the ball, to pass it to devastating effect. Nor are they athletic enough, or perhaps able to read the game well enough, to close down the Rooney’s and Sterlings.
There was a moment on Sunday when probably our best player this season, Snoddy, had a golden chance. In the commentator’s words, not mine, he needed one touch too many and that just sums up where we are at.
What we needed in January, well in August actually, were players at the Downing, Adam Johnson, Huddlestone level; not Bradley Johnson, Tettey or Howson – they should be on the bench. Nobody in our squad has ever looked capable of taking control of the game from midfield.
But we do not pay the wages to attract that kind of player. That is of course why Lambert could not wait to move. He just picked a different poisoned chalice.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the attitude and commitment of guys like Russell Martin, can’t fault them for that. But there’s a reason they had to come up the hard way, Wycombe, Peterborough, us in Russell’s case. In the end they don’t have the ability to play at top level and never have had. Sheer hard work can only do so much.
The biggest positive I can see now is that we are, in my view, a very attractive proposition for a manager on the up. We are better off than most in the Championship, we will be amongst the best supported, and we have (in the Murphys, Loza, and the returning Rudd) a group of eager and capable young players to develop. What’s not to like?
I just hope McNally finds the right guy and sells it to him.
Hindsight was never needed,all you had to do was watch what happened on the grass……the bloody obvious has come to pass. It was sad to be derided as an “outer” and unfortunately this publication encouraged that derision and division. It was legitimate gripes about on(and off) field failings.
I have consistently said that McNally is massively over rated as well as hugely over paid and kept pointing out what a horlicks was made of the Lambert move.The future is bleak,the few players of merit will be prised away(jump at the chance probably) and then a fire sale will be needed to limit wage costs and seperate the(mostly)chaff from the wheat. A below average championship squad is likely to emerge.
Baggies fans know they’ve got off the relegation hook big time despite (not because of) Pepe Mel. They turned up with flip-flops and deckchairs last night but our fate was already sealed. The style may have been unedifying up to April, but those claiming that relegation was always in the offing (from day 1 seemingly) are masochists. Sunderland have achieved a footballing miracle (look at the stats for clubs bottom at Christmas) but we assisted them with our collapse in the last 6-8 games. They’ve done what Wigan did for 2-3 seasons – hang in the bottom 3 for 90% of the season and then claw out of it. Fingers crossed that they, WBA and Villa suffer our fate next season.
That said, based on goal difference alone, the 3 teams that have gone down deserve to have done. For us, chronically poor finishing and a dollop of bad luck have done for us – 3 of the 12 MOTD nominations for save of the season came against us – more than any team.
The PL for all the hype is toxic to our national game – Man City (likely champs) have scored 149 goals in total this season..2 of those by an Englishman…
Peter (10): if you look back, I think you’ll find that the ‘outers’ were always treated respectfully on here, including by those of us who disagreed. The abuse and derision came almost entirely the other way, directed by the outers at the rest of us, as it continues to be.
David McNally is not infallible, and I’m sure we’ll see him take responsibility for this season’s outcome. But to call him ‘massively over-rated’ is plain ridiculous. Compare where we were when he took over – a demoralised, disorganised, broke club in the third tier – to where we are now, and it’s a remarkable turnaround for which we should be eternally grateful to him.
By the way, an example of a clear, rational and spot-on analysis is right here: Keith B (9).
@6 Stewart Lewis
http://www.premierleague.com has a nice function that shows the league as it stood at games played (it oddly breaks at around week 35, but it’s easy to figure out). In essence removing all ‘games-in-hand’ and falsely inflated position issues.
Here’s how many pts above relegation we were at certain times…
Games played / pts above relegation
5 | 0pts (above on GD)
10 | Relegation
15 | +4pts
20 | +3pts
25 | +2pts
30 | +6pts
35 | Relegation
37 | Relegated
What this shows is that we never opened a gap over the bottom three that would allow us comfort going into the last four (or five if you inc. our bogey team) games.
While people were talking about position and “we’re just 3 pts off 10th”, the reality was we’ve skirted the relegation zone all season long. When you’re a yo-yo team all that matters is pts above relegation. Not position or how high you ‘could’ be.
We played the “three teams worse than us” game. For long periods there were. But if you’re only a few pts. above relegation all it takes is one in three teams to go on a mini run and you’re done. We shouldn’t be surprised.
Throughout this disastrous campaign I have consistently supported Dave B, and all others like him, who saw that there was an urgent need for change in order to avoid what has come to pass. Unfortunately all season, and even now unbelievably, we are being told by some that if we had kept Hughton we would have been OK. For the life of me, I can’t fathom how anyone can still think that!
I would have made the decision a lot earlier than the Board but I also recognise that they gave him every chance, which is commendable.
If anyone thinks we have been “vindicated” or are happy with the outcome, please think again.
For all it’s faults, I would still rather be in The Premier League than not.
As to the future, much as I like Neil Adams, I would not offer it to him. Malky is the man to get us back. I would offload as many of this squad as possible, introduce more of the youth players and go back to a transfer policy that involves players on their way up the ladder rather than on their way down.
We will be financially better than most, if not all, in The Championship. There is no reason why, if managed properly, we cannot get back at the first attempt.
A neutral football fan but like the city. From outside looking in, I remerberd thinking that what a “bonkers” to sack chris hughton at that stage, with a huge six point match against Fulham coming up. If I remeber correctly, your had a 5 point gap to the relegation place and hughton cautious appoaches would suit the fight to aviod relegation, which surely is most important, depite some fans apparent unhappy with Hughton. Unrealistic expectations and the board
To continue the above comment: it may sound harsh, the unrealistic.expectations of some fans, and the panic of the board of directors, imo. And another thing, wonderful team performance against Chelsea match maybe, but you needed a win to put pressures on sunderland and WBA, not just to play not to lose. Maybe the manager calculated the the points needed wrong, like a certain Manchester city manager did once?
Neutral (15): regular readers here would expect me to agree with you, but I can’t. Personally I wouldn’t have sacked Hughton at that point, given his record against the kind of teams we still had to play. But it wasn’t bonkers; it was understandable exactly because of that six-pointer at Fulham. Under Hughton, our away performances were in a rut and that game was likely to be lost. Adams’ appointment releaed energy in the players, which might have been enough to win that key game and (almost certainly, as it seemed) save us. It didn’t work, but it might have done.
So I find myself squeezed between Dave B and Gary Lineker. Not the most comfortable of positions…
Dave B(13) – your stats are accurate but (as always) selective and so the conclusions you draw are not rigorous.
e.g.(1) – after 20 games (1/1/2014) we were indeed 3 points above 18th and so justified in sacking Hughton (by your line of argument). Two words..West and Ham – they were 17th at that stage (5 points below us). They stuck with their experienced boss and are headed for a 12th finish.
e.g.(2) – in the history of the PL, there have been 4 other times when a team has been 3 points above the bottom 3 at year end – none were subsequently relegated. 4 other seasons, teams were 4 points above relegation at year end – none were relegated.
While that shows that we have broken an undesired record, it also shows just how extraordinary (and unique) an escape Sunderland have performed. It doesn’t make me feel any better about relegation but it puts the kibosh on your sacking criteria.
Out of interest, who would you have had fill Hughton’s boots back in Jan.?
Re: Leeds Mick (6) – having lived in Headingley for a few years, I have sympathy for the plight of your once fine club. The transfer ‘history’ really does rankle doesn’t it? You got Steve ‘1 M not 2’ Morison in return! Besides that money we gave you for our quartet (well, trio + Becchio) has kept you largely afloat ahead of your Italian ‘businessman’ riding to the rescue. We’ll do you an exchange – our ‘flying Dutchman’ for Ross McCormack? Look forward to the battles to come.
Stato (18): nice work. Actually, Dave B wouldn’t have sacked Hughton in Jan. He’d have sacked him last summer, after Hughton took a low-spending club, in the famously-difficult second season and ranking 18th in the wage table, and led them to an 11th place finish. Obviously not nearly good enough for our Dave.
@18 Stato
My stats were neither selective nor my conclusion wrong (as witnessed by the fact we’ve been relegated). Did I list every week? No, but showing every 5th game, by gameweek, is hardly ‘selective’. I could list them all and the pattern would be the same.
As to your examples. (1) West Ham had a better, more experienced, hardened manager who, unlike Hughton last season, turned around the performances of the club far before the season ended. Your argument fails because Sam turned around the club LONG before Hughton was sacked. Hughton had his chance and he didn’t take it.
(2) Looking at old seasons and saying ‘we’ll be fine from relegation because x happened in 200x’ makes no more sense than saying ‘I rolled a 6 on this dice five times, therefore the next time must be a six”.
If this season has taught us anything it’s that patterns are made to be broken. Ask any Man U fan who has seen countless records fall. Ask Liverpool who haven’t seen their team in the mix on the last day in decades. Ask Sunderland who have made the unlikely escape.
And here’s the true failing of saying that it’s down to an extraordinary run of games by Sunderland that we’re getting relegated. Wait for it, because this is a good one….
If Sunderland hadn’t gone on that run, if they were still bottom and we were 17th, there would still be a very good chance of us being relegated, as Fulham entertain Palace and we entertain Arsenal on the last day, and all it would take is us to lose, them to win, and we’d STILL be relegated. With Sunderland having nothing to do with it.
The Sunderland excuse is a red herring. A scapegoat. Another excuse in the long line of excuses dragged out this season.
Dave B – just pointing out that the use of stats (as you are very prone to) can come back to bite. I think it is valid to put things in historical (not hysterical) perspective.
Sunderland’s run isn’t an excuse – they deserve to stay up after the performances they put in..it’s the Baggies who don’t deserve any credit and our lot for not scoring enough goals.
I see you didn’t answer my last question – who would you have brought in? Pepe Mel perhaps?!