It’s my first piece for MyFootballWriter and, unlike me, it’s going to be a negative one.
Unfortunately for City, in the last two games – especially against Nottingham Forest – they’ve experienced the cruel world of football. This has been the trigger for many supporters to question where the form from earlier this season has disappeared to.
But, despite this irritating dip in form, please think before you tweet. Some of the post-Forest social media content on Saturday night was extraordinary (in a bad way), unbelievable and, actually, just plain stupid.
“Neil out, Pulis in” was one that made my blood boil. How can the same Hughton-haters be flying the Pulis flag?
I suspect after reading this piece someone will point me in the direction of his results. But the Pulis and Hughton style of play is lifeless, churned out and undeniably boring. Why would you wish for that football to come back to Carrow Road?
We’re better than that.
I am often too positive and see things through yellow and green tinted glasses – I hold my hands up and accept that – but I will defend Neil Adams right up until it gets messy, which it is starting to now.
The reason behind defending him is that he is Norwich City through and through, much like Bryan Gunn. The situation Neil has been plonked in to is so wrong and I am surprised we haven’t learnt from what we put Bryan and his backroom team through. You get where I am going here, I’m sure.
If you’re going to turn your backs on someone don’t turn them on Neil. No-one with yellow and green blood running through them would turn down that job offer. The man is doing the best job he can with the experience he’s got, negativity will not help him improve.
I’ve personally turned my back on the board. Not the man that helped fund the signing fee for one of our greatest ever goal scorers (out of his own pocket) and not the famous cook that has kept us afloat for so many years now. But the man that hired Neil – the one at the top of the Norwich City Christmas tree – who has somehow maintained a glowing reputation as the Messiah of Norwich. Untouchable of any criticism.
To get the club back in a positive financial situation is a huge achievement. I am not taking that away from him for that because now we have the funds and squad available to win this league with ease. Credit where credit is due.
But I wish we would stop banging the no-debt drum and started to put our money where our mouth is. Let’s commit to paying big wages for experienced managers and talented footballers. We’re playing it too safe in this league for the sake of keeping the finances all in order.
I’ll steer clear of the ‘oh and Ipswich are above us now’ line.
Moving forward I’d really like to see some balls from those in control of this great football club. They need to come out and instil some confidence and buzz back into the place. I’m talking press coverage on how they’re committed to helping Adams, dropping a few lines on our hopes of landing some big January transfer window signings and also, showing some more respect to the Norwich City away-day faithful.
I am in favour of refunding those devoted fans who travelled to Middlesborough. What a shambolic display – no one can come out and hide behind any excuses. It needs to happen, especially if the club want our continued support away from home – which I personally would say they take for granted. Also Norwich is one of the most expensive places in the Football League to own a season ticket.
Having taken 20 points in our first nine games, we’ve since taken just six from our last eight. This stat is something we have to turn around. Every team goes through a tough patch during the season, especially in one of the toughest leagues to get promoted from in world football.
Football can change very quickly. It was only a few weeks ago that the Yellow Army were bellowing at the top of their voices “We’ve got our Norwich back”. Where has that passion gone? The players have to lift the crowd, we all know that. I also know that when the Barclay is creating an electric atmosphere there haven’t been many occasions where the team has let us down. We’ve still got the chance to turn it all around.
And with two games at Carrow Road coming up what a great chance to do so.
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You can follow Chris on Twitter @ChrisReevo
Neil, Neil, just an appeal,
After Forest I was feeling sick,
Neil, Neil, do it with zeal,
Get it sorted, make things click.
.. nice first piece Chris. I presume your displeasure is directed at Mr. McNally – why not call a spade a spade?
Neil got 5 games at the end of last season to prove he was good enough for the job. I give him the next 5 to prove Mr. McNally right!
An interesting perspective, Chris. But I wonder if there might be one or two problems with it.
Perhaps the main one is your view of – yes, we can name him – David McNally. You’re saying that the man who came into the club in 2009, immediately saw the error of Gunn’s appointment and ruthlessly replaced him with Lambert, and has worked rigorously every day since to professionalise the club, earning himself some unflattering titles – you’re saying that this David McNally has reverted to a Gunn-type appointment and is standing idly by while the club deteriorates.
Sorry – that doesn’t make any sense. The differences between Adams and Gunn far outnumber the similarities, tempting as they are to reach for when we have a blip. The fact is that – Middlesbrough apart – City have been competitive. There are things to sort out, and we’ll see if Neil can do it, but there isn’t a hint of the demoralised shambles we saw in 2008-09. Oh, and we’re 6 points off the top.
Yes, Neil is learning – as most managers continue to do. But unlike Gunn, he’s clearly capable of good decisions as well as questionable ones. If we think the squad is well equipped for the Championship (I’ll ignore the ‘win the league with ease’ nonsense), it’s Neil who has put that squad together. Now he has to figure the best permutation of the squad; I’ve seen enough good judgement on his part to give him time.
Whether the driven David McNally will do the same is up for debate.
I appreciate your point about Pulis being “boring” when it comes to playing style however I would challenge this because football is about results. If Norwich win matches, supporting them is fun and hence the (majority of) fans are happy. Regardless of the style there are very few fans of any club that would take an “exciting” mid-table finish over winning the league/ getting promoted in a “boring” manner.
Ask the Crystal Palace fans last year if they found Pulis boring… Obviously, the problem comes if there is a boring manager and the results do not come, like last year.
AVE (3): I was going to make a similar point about Pulis. But it may not apply here. Many City fans were unhappy with Hughton during his first season here, despite him leading us – miraculously, in the eyes of most observers – to an 11th place finish in the Prem.
Neil, Neil ,
Orange peel….
@Stewart Lewis
While I agree that David McNally came in with a big splash and really turned the ship around quickly. I’d disagree that he’s still doing such a good job.
It’s easy to come in when you’re not immediately familiar with all the faces at the club and fire a few people. It’s very different to have spent five years surrounded by people, becoming friends, having your mean streak tempered by Delia, and still be as ruthless.
The evidence of the last 18 months shows the following:
1) When the going got tough McNally left Twitter.
2) When big decisions needed to be made around management, none were.
3) Communication has been misleading at best. “Scoured Europe” and couldn’t find someone, yet that person could have been appointed in Jan.
4) Allowing terrible player purchases under Hughton.
5) Not pushing for attacking minded staff under Hughton.
6) The hiring of a manager with 5 professional game’s worth of experience.
7) Not hiring experienced people to support Adams.
8) A farcical pre season that could not have been less professional.
9) Already firing, without comment, someone you just promoted to a role. Bad hiring decision or scapegoat?
10) Leading the team to relegation and a catastrophic drop in revenues (ignore this financial period’s results, it will appear next year).
11) “We don’t need to sell players”… McNally. “I’d like to keep Fer”… Adams. Fer goes to QPR.
Yes, that’s just the negative. That’s because really, if you want to look at his positive impact, it stopped 2-3 years ago, there’s not been much since. We are reaping the financial rewards now, but those impacts are always delayed.
Interesting first piece Chris, but just one quick question. What part of the ten men behind the ball at Forest football did you not consider Hughtonesque? We have a lot of talented attacking players with a lot more space in this division than in the Premier League. This does not mean that Adams is a great attack minded coach he has shown he is as capable of the fallback away from home performance as Hughton. Boring football is not the issue, this season winning football is the key and anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves. Pulis is the better qualified man for the job than Adams.
You said it Adams and Gunn in the sentence
It says it all , no difference clueless!!!
Dave B: you make some salient points – and perhaps some not-so-salient ones.
I suspect you haven’t been around the club much recently, or you might not talk of McNally ‘having his mean streak tempered by Delia’. The staffing changes he’s implemented recently, to reflect the financial impacts of relegation, have been fierce. He’s as committed and driven as ever – perhaps more so, as he thinks you may be right and Hughton should have been fired last December (when we were 13th).
He’s not an expert on players, and will take no credit for the excellent signings under Hughton (two of whom we’ve sold for massive profit; others we could but haven’t). By the same token, perhaps we shouldn’t direct too much blame at him personally for the poor judgement in signing van Wolfswinkel (which I assume you’re referring to). Also, I thought you were smart enough to recognise the difference between ‘we don’t have to sell’ and deciding that a particular sale may be in the club’s interest. Perhaps we could take a poll of how many think it was wrong to exchange Fer for O’Neil, Jerome and £8m.
It’ll be interesting when we learn more about Robson’s departure. My hypothesis – no more valid or informed than anyone else’s – is something along these lines. The chemistry between Adams, Robson and Holt wasn’t working as well as hoped. After the Forest game there was some kind of bust-up (it would actually be worrying if there wasn’t), and the decision was taken to use that in order to make a clean break. If so, I can’t see that it warrants criticism of McNally. But in this case I may be totally wrong!
(Some) City fans say he should carry the can,
McNally’s dillied-dallied all the way,
Off went van(Wolfswinkel) on a season’s loan,
The club’s lost its way and is struggling at home,
He dallied and dillied, dillied and dallied….etc
..to the tune of the old music hall favourite – one for the kids there.
@StewartLewis
“The staffing changes he’s implemented recently, to reflect the financial impacts of relegation, have been fierce.”
I’m not giving you that. He oversaw a relegation and a financial slump. You’re now giving him credit for firing people as a result of it? That’s a world different from getting rid of underperforming players and management.
As for Fer, all I can say is that McNally said we didn’t have to sell players and funds would be available for signings. I don’t ever remember him saying purchases were dependent on sales. Also, according to Adams, Fer left because he had made it known he wanted to leave. Funnily that didn’t stop us holding on to Wes.
Dave B: I’m not giving him credit for firing people! Just addressing your assertion that he’s gone soft – whatever we think about his judgement, your assertion is baseless.
Was the sale of Leroy Fer sensible for the club, or not? Fer made it clear he wasn’t motivated to play in the Championship, under Adams or anyone else (unlike Wes, who WAS influenced by the choice of manager and wanted to play this year for Adams). McNally played hardball over Wes last January because our criteria for selling – a fair price and the chance to get a replacement – weren’t met. That’s his professionalism, still intact.
I would not call Adams football that attacking and on the whole its pretty boring . Pulis and promotion or Adams and another decade in the Championship …its really not a hard choice is it .
The reason that Adams has come in to all this criticism is because the team got off to a flier.Had we struggled in the first 6 games [we would have had the same discussion then]and then put a few results together to find ourselves 6 points off the top most fans would be comparing him to sliced bread…Come on Norwich fans..Give the bloke a chance.
Step back and really analyse things. McNally got lucky with Lambert and despite the bluster there has been very little evidence to suggest that he is competent at his job. Quite the contrary, he looks like an over paid CE who has made some truly appalling decisions worst of which was to appoint an inexperienced manager who is looking increasingly lost as each week of failure passes. I said at the time of Adam’s appointment that this was dreadful decision and one that may well condemn our club too many more years in the Championship or worse.
Paul (15): ‘McNally got lucky with Lambert’? He worked with Lambert at close quarters at Celtic, and knew exactly what he’d offer. No luck involved. When Lambert abandoned us, McNally sought someone who’d keep our low-budget squad in the Premiership (at least through the vital next season leading to the new TV deal) and found the man in Hughton. Across all that, he’s transformed the club from one where administration looked inevitable to a strong business capable of giving its manager competitive budgets.
Last season was a failure, and McNally makes no effort to escape responsibility for it. Adams’ appointment looked inspired last month and uncertain now. In another month it may look inspired again, or a dud. Personally I can’t tell yet.
Reading through the comments I amazed that no one has highlighted where a lot of the fault really lies – the players.
I’m not defending Hughton’s approach but the last 18 months in the Premiership we were also let down but a fundamental lack of character & leadership in the squad, and now that times have inevitably got tough, it strikes me that Martin & O’Neil excepted, that that lack of character is showing through.
I trust McNally and Adams to sort this out (sorry be to compare Adams with Gunn is just laughable), so far they have got more decisions right that wrong but that does not mean they haven’t made a few mistakes, (most of which only get criticised on forums like this one with the benefit of hindsight, for example who predicted that when we brought three centre backs in the last window all three would turn out to be rubbish).
Its clear to me that although the squad was strengthened in the summer, and I still think its good enough to get promoted, there is still a lot of dead wood in it. The current situation is not helped by Turner, Martin, Olsson & Grabban all losing form at the same time, but we have seen enough of them to trust they will turn it around. However, I personally feel that Whittaker, Cuellar, Johnson, Hooper, Hooiveld, Bunn, Miquel, Bassong & Becchio aren’t good enough to play for NCFC and the jury’s out on E Bennett and sadly Hoolahan too. That is a lot to replace but having watched the Youth Cup campaign, I wonder if there is more character in the likes of McGeehan, McFadden and Toffolo.
@stewart lewis: Thanks for your comment but how many were unhappy during the 10 game unbeaten run (when they beat Man Utd and Arsenal), which ultimately kept us up.It was our dismal end to the season where many realised the boring style, so I still believe the happiness of fans depends upon the team getting positive results. That said, I completely agree the risk of a “boring” manager not getting positive results is a very poor prospect for the fans.
I guess they have to decide between sticking with the inexperience Adams at the risk of an average season, possibly getting into the playoff or to take another gamble and get in an experienced manager, who though?!!?.
For me, a good compromise would to get Pulis in as manager (before someone else does) and have Neil as his assistant. Similar to how Palace kept Keith Millen. This way we don’t get rid of a good coach in Adams who loves the club and in comes an experience manager used to getting the most out of his players. The other option is to get Mike Phelan as assistant but don’t know how he would feel about this role.
Our squad is more than capable of getting promoted this season, most fans (of even other clubs) agree, which makes all the worse to see us mid-table.
AVE: Cheers, fair points. The one scenario I can’t envisage is Neil agreeing to step down to number 2. If we don’t want him as manager, then I think he’d want out. His pride couldn’t take the demotion (nor could mine, in his shoes).
No getting away from the fact that Palace fans loved Pulis last year. It’s not the syle I’d want my team to play in – but it seems to get the results that, in the end, are the biggest determinant of fans’ happiness.
@Stewart lewis
Perhaps I’m unclear as to what a Chief Executive does, but my understanding is that every major decision for the club will need, at bare minimum, to be passed by him. But, he’s not actually doing the work. That’s why he’ll have financial officers, football managers, scouts, communications directors etc…
So on the one hand you’re praising him for the financial wing getting things right in ’09 – ’14, yet excusing the footballing wing for the signing of a group of players with no experience in the Prem. The “excellent signings” got us relegated, btw. You say we shouldn’t blame him personally for Van Wolfswinkel, but then say he did well with Hoolahan. I’m not sure I understand his role.
In a business the size of Norwich, trust me that some, if not all of those signings would have required his signature. When you’re talking about one of the biggest (if not the biggest) investments a club has ever made a Chief Exec should be doing their full due diligence. That said investment is off on loan within 12 months, the second biggest investment is sitting on our bench, and the third we’ve not been able to retain, isn’t great. We may have a few more quid in our back pocket from Fer, but again, I think you’re praising McNally for failure. We’ve got the money for Fer because we were relegated and couldn’t keep him. That’s not the type of success I want to see. If we’re relegated to League 1 and sell all this season’s signings for profit, are we doing well? If we sell players and replace them with twice as many lower standard players, are we doing well?
I’d thank McNally for ridding our club of debt. But in all honesty, he took over we were a team that would finish 22nd in The Championship. We’re now 12 places higher. It’s not blowing me away.
Dave B: I think others can see the glaring inconsistencies in your arguments, so I won’t labour them. Just two quick points. McNally is responsible for the business side of the club, including negotiation of deals; he’s not responsible for identifying potential signings. Therefore he was responsible for doing the Fer deal and resisting pressure to sell Wes cheap to Villa with no replacement; but not for the identification of Redmond, Snodgrass, Jerome (or van Wolfswinkel).
Second, the team he inherited was 22nd in League 1, not the Champ – and looked like going further down. Remember Colchester (h)?
@Stewart Lewis I agree with you. It would be a massive issue with pride and not an option I particularly think Norwich should take.
Personally i would give Adams the season as they seem to have backed him from last year. Maybe a bit of stability would be good and although possibly mean we may not go up this season, we build for the next few. How knows though, probably a 4-5 game run would put us back back among the top few places?
Also, a bit of realism, the league is so competitive and every year there is almost always a “surprise” club that does well, Blackpool and Burnley spring to mind. This means that even if the club is the so called favorites there are not guarantees, in fact its worse as teams set-up not to lose. QPR last season would probably agree.
I think Norwich have a good squad and with a settled side with no injuries they can push for the playoffs. A good run at some point this season should do this. There’s normally a team in the bottom half in Jan that does really well and finishes 5 or 6. Our league position is not too concerning yet…
That said the frustration form some of the fans is valid, a good assistant with some ideas about being a big club in the championship may help. That and the strikers finding consistent form. (To be fair I’ve been pleasantly surprised by Jerome).
I agree 100% that the performance of DM over the last couple of years should be critically examined. Dave B makes several good points to which I would like to add the following.
Getting the Club into a position where it could clear its external debt was entirely due to reaching the Premiership. DM can take some credit for appointing Lambert but I think that appointment was based on a degree of good fortune because both had worked at Celtic rather than as a result of a comprehensive headhunting / selection process.
DM has been handsomely rewarded for his recent performance, earning £1640k in 2013 and £1119k in 2014. These figures included performance bonuses of £867k in i2013 and £367k in 2014 for achieving financial targets in the year. How relegation, which will see a dramatic drop in profitability, did not immediately result in the 2014 bonus being cancelled is beyond me. In fact it is much more likely that shareholders of a Plc would seek the removal of a Chief Executive who had presided over such a disastrous year. I hope that the Board have at least cut his salary by 50% in line with the playing staff and also set more challenging targets for a bonus in2015.
It is also worth mentioning that the new football operating structure, initiated and chaired by DM is not proving to be an over-whelming success. It was almost certainly the reason why several high profile managers withdrew their interest in the Norwich job in the Summer when they realised they would have to report to DM on football matters.
BB: Thanks, some fair points. I confess I didn’t realise several high-profile managers withdrew their interest in the Norwich job when they realised they’d be reporting to DM. Would you care to share some names?
BB: Sorry, meant to add this. Even on your own figures, DM took a pay cut of over 30% in 2014. Given that your figures relate to the financial year 2013-14, he’ll no doubt have a bigger cut following relegation. Hardly a case of escaping responsibility.
I know many Boards and sets of shareholders. I don’t know one which would look at DM’s record with what he inherited in 2009, and would now be calling for his removal.
@21. Firstly he joined just after we had been relegated and long before our League 1 campaign kicked off. Are you confusing him with Lambert’s appointment?
Regarding what he’s responsible for and what he’s not. Unless Norwich have a rather unique setup, most CE’s (MDs or CEOs) are responsible for everything. While there’s a line of report to him, he’s responsible. That means even if he hires the person, who hires the person, who hires the scout, who suggested Van Wolfswinkel, he’s ultimately responsible.
The buck stops at the top. &*^# rolls downhill.
He hires the manager, he’s responsible for the team’s results. He hires a good accountant, he’s responsible for the financial results etc.
You’re suggesting he’s responsible for the selling, but not the buying of the players. I’d say that was HIGHLY unlikely and I’d be really interested to know who you think is responsible if not him.