In a week in which all the focus had been on transfer wrangling and a crucial CEO appointment, Thursday night’s breaking news of the final departure of Ricky van Wolfswinkel came somewhat out of the blue.
Even those anointed few fans who claim to have some special tap-in to the news grapevine coming out of Carrow Road seem to have been taken back on their heels by the announcement.
This surprise and yet ultimately predictable squad development brings down the curtain on Ricky’s professionally painful, if financially rewarding, time with the Canaries.
It was telling that on Friday morning, the BBC Sport website contained no indication of the transfer on their front page; Samir Nasri’s pizza-related weight issues at Man City a seemingly far more important issue.
The Wolf will be returning to Vitesse Arnhem (having first joined them at age ten) – a name familiar to those who recall Mike Walker’s 1993 UEFA Cup campaign. While still in the Dutch top flight, they only finished 9th last season and so Ricky will not be seeing any European action.
He joins the likes of Eloy Room, Marvelous Nakamba and Lewis Baker (one of the vast swathe of Chelsea loanees) at the Gelredome – a stadium that possesses not only a retractable roof but also, most impressively, a retractable pitch for non-football events!
City’s recent run with strikers tells a sorry tale – the Wolf, Hooper, Grabban, Bamford and Lafferty, the last of whom must surely be packing his bags for alternative employment shortly. Dieumerci Mbokani can hold his head high in such company.
With just Cameron Jerome and Steven Naismith left as viable striking options, the focus of club and supporters will no doubt quickly shift back to the negotiations with Fulham for their want-away striker.
Resolution of that situation must wait for another day, so I’ll keep focused here on the trials and tribulations of the Dutch lad who arrived in Norfolk with such fanfare and adulation, but returned to Holland with regrets and no small amount of criticism.
And his record over the past three years does not provide him with a solid defence.
Despite finding an uncritical niche personal fan club – seemingly for his good looks and hairstyle – a handful of first-team outings and a single league goal is a shocking return on the record transfer fee paid in the now defunct McNally/Hughton era.
But how could it have gone so very wrong?
Every man/woman and his/her dog has a pet theory. Some seem determined to lay the blame anywhere but the Wolf himself.
1. Manager – Hughton, Adams and Neil.
All failed to identify and utilise his talents to their best potential.
Whatever your opinion of this triumvirate, it seems highly unlikely that their vast combined professional experience could have failed in this regard.
Indeed, just last summer with Ricky back from his loan year in France, Alex Neil, after seeing his ‘new’ striker at Colney and in pre-season games, said:
“I don’t think he is ever going to be a big, strapping centre forward who is going to bash people about, however, if we can get the ball around the middle of the park the one thing he is good at is running off defenders’ shoulders and creating angles and creating space for himself.”
Physicality was always a clear problem for Ricky in the cut and thrust of the top flight. Whether he would have fared better in the Championship we will never know. I suspect he would have struggled just as much in a division where brute strength is more of a necessary quality in the light of lower skill levels.
Clearly, his managers while on loan in France and Spain could equally be accused of failing him if you buy into this particular theory.
2. Robert Snodgrass
That incident where Snoddy snatched the ball and missed the penalty in a 1-0 defeat to Paul Lambert’s Aston Villa in 2013 when Ricky was the appointed penalty taker. Chris Hughton insisted the Wolf would take penalties in future.
Sadly, you can only take a penalty if you are in the team and on the pitch, which was Ricky’s enduring problem.
Personally, this theory is garbage. And even if it isn’t, Ricky has to develop a hell of a thicker skin if he is ever to shine on the big stage again. Also, I would have Snoddy back in yellow and green any day.
3. Bad luck and/or evil cosmic forces
If theories 1 and 2 don’t cut it and you’re still willing to give Ricky the benefit of the doubt, then his failure all comes down to a straw-clutching combination of unfortunate timing, poor service from colleagues, bumpy pitches and colliding black holes warping space-time around his boots.
4. Just one of those things
Yep, the just throw your hands in the air and say “s**t happens” approach. Not the most scientific but probably the nearest to the truth. Wrong player, wrong club, wrong time – it’s happened before to others and will happen again.
You may have your own pet theory.
Yet, whatever the reason, both Ricky and Norwich will quickly move on and his failings will be left to fade into history via online chatter and suitably-themed pub quiz rounds.
So long Ricky, and thanks for all the….
Nice summary, Russ.
I’ve some sympathy for the Snoddy theory – after all, with that pen Ricky would have scored 2 in his first 3 league games, with a ‘worldie’ denying him at Hull in the other game. Who knows what might have followed that confidence boost?
Having said that, the RvW experiment was probably always doomed to failure. Much of the criticism directed at Chris Hughton by Norwich fans seems to me excessive, but in this case he must bear the brunt. To think that Ricky was physically and/or mentally up to leading the line of a lower-half Premier league team was a bit bizarre.
No reason for us not to wish him well. Wolf by name but – sadly – more Lamb by nature.
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I’m with Stewart on the Snodgrass theory. If he had taken it & scored, who knows what might have happened. But he didn’t & the rest is history. I believe he had an injury which also didn’t help matters.
For me it’s a massive disappointment as alongside Hucks, RvW was the most excited I’d even been about a signing and as such I was desperate for a happy ending. I hope he salvages his career.
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I was right behind the goal – I always am:-) – for the Snodgrass incident and it was a bit tasty, as you might say.
I’ve plenty of sympathy for this theory as you could almost literally see the frustration and embarrassment burning on RvW.
And no amount of professsional sports pyschologists can help a fragile ego come back from something like that.
As Stewart says above, no reason not to wish him well. He was an expensive experiment that failed. It’s All Over Now, as Jagger said.
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If his ego was fragile I’m sure Snoddy shouting ‘you can’t hit it’ (As in you can’t kick a football, not you’re not allowed to take it) as the reason why he was taking the penalty of him probably did dent his confidence.
Snoddy was right though and he probably did have a better chance of putting it away than RVW. I’m pretty sure he would’ve messed up the penalty anyway because he can’t handle pressure.
We smelt a bargain because he was available for half his release clause and signed a player without properly scouting him. Shit happens but you would hope the club has learned its lesson.
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I wish he’d been strong enough to take the ball back from Snodgrass and i guess the fact he wasn’t hints at a bit of weakness mentally. Though the Snodgrass incident suggests to me that he wasn’t completely welcome at the club. I think he’s been getting better on his loans in Europe. He scored some belters for St. Etienne and his record in France and Spain is good for the numer of games he played. He also played very well against Rotherham in the league cup in his last professional game for us, scoring, having one ruled out and setting up a good few chances. Rotherham are a championship team and i expect on that evidence, Ricky would have done well at that level. Our managers didn’t utilise him in this regard; when you see him scoring all his goals in Europe, there were always players up in support, able to lay that final pass when he made the run, but with us, even in the most recent friendly, he was used as a lone striker with not a lot of support. There was no point signing him unless we were going to play 4-4-2 or have midfielders playing high. A combination of things conspired to assure failure. The penalty, the injury, then coming back from injury into a team fighting relegation and being used as a lone striker running about like a headless chicken in a formation that was never going to suit him.
So while he definitely was a little week psychologically i think its true that none of our managers played the right system for him. Against opposition like Rotherham, there was enough space for players to support him, due to lack of quality, and he was prominent, but that would rarely happen in the prem. I still think he could have done a job in the champ but we’ll never know. I expect he wanted the move back to Holland as he probably has bad associations with us and needs to start again. Big shame we never got to see the player who smacked in a hat-trick against Celtic (the club AN got famous for scraping a 1-0 win against with Hamilton). We never saw the player who walloped in goals from all angles with Sporting Lisbon, including plenty in Europe against Man City and other top clubs. Quality of opposition wasn’t a problem for him then. He actually got into the Dutch national team which is really hard to believe for Norwich fans! Something got to him here and destroyed his confidence. I really do wish him all the best and hope he gets that confidence back. If he can, i’ll look forward to seeing him banging the goals in again, though he’ll have to become very prolific to get back into the Dutch national team.
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Ricky Spanish (4): yeah my recollection of the incident is the same as yours – with a couple of swearies chucked in as I recall.
The only thing I didn’t get is that RvW had converted several pens for Lisbon the season before – so which of them was truly in the wrong?
All history now, of course. Your final sentence is spot on.
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Cheers all for the passionate and entertaining comments.
Whatever the reason(s) for Ricky’s failure, it provides a classic lesson in not trusting Youtube video clips before seeing someone in the flesh and under pressure. From this day forth, let such an expensive flop be referred to as a ‘Ricky’.
Many NCFC fans seem to have ‘unfollowed’ him but I’ll be keeping my eyes peeled on his progress next season if only to see if we got it horribly wrong or if his bolt has been permanently shot.
I’m all for the retracting pitch concept at Carrow Road and will be campaigning for its introduction asap.
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