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Two for the price of one – why the Murphy twins might be just the ticket for City’s ever-hungry boss

7th August 2016 By Rick Waghorn 1 Comment

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My Mum is 85. Done well, to be fair.

Given that she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer when she was 79.

Anyone who knows their cancers can do the math.

The point is that she is an identical twin. Grannie One and Grannie Two, as my boy used to describe them.

And so I’ve had the thick end of 50 years to watch how twins work. 

How they are alike, but not alike. And how there tends to be a competitive streak a mile wide between them. Even at 85.

Which brings us back to Norwich. And the Murphy boys, Jacob and Josh.

This weekend’s opener at Ewood Park was a class strike.

It was the one, individual goal of the bunch – given the rest were prime examples of passing knives through butter team-wise.

Not so Jacob’s.

After grabbing nine goals in his 40 appearances for Coventry last season, the 21-year-old is fast blossoming into a Championship contender.

Whether he can step up to the next level is for the future.

Right now that goal alone suggests the Canaries might have unearthed that rarest of beasts – a genuine, home-grown talent. Albeit one born in Wembley rather than Winterton.

What intrigues me is what flashed through Josh’s mind the moment his bro let fly.

Or, indeed, the moment when Alex Neil pinned the team-sheet to the door of the changing room. And it wasn’t the J Murphy he had hoped for.

I’m sure he would have been delighted for his brother’s good fortune.

I’m sure he was. Delighted. Absolutely.

And the thought of having to go one better the next time opportunity knocked would not have crossed his mind. At all.

And nor, I suspect, would it have crossed the mind of Neil.

At all.

That Mother Nature in the form of Mother Murphy could have given him such a blessing in his hour of Championship need.

Two talented 21-year-olds for the price of one.

Watch Neil in his post match interviews and he’s playing a canny game here. 

Putting his faith in the young and the hungry. Those with points to prove.

Be it to Spurs or whoever – each other in the case of the Murphy twins.

Because as much they will have yellow and green blood coursing through their veins courtesy of Norwich their ‘mother’ club and having that FA Youth Cup to their names, they also have each other’s blood coursing through their veins.

And that realisation could be a minor stroke of managerial genius from the Scot if he quietly plays one off against the other in terms of first team opportunities – and the accolades he opts to heap on one, or the other, if they continue to deliver the goods Ewood-style.

Because twins compete.

That’s how they work. 

They have been competing for a mother’s resource since they were in the womb. And not a lot will have changed since.

Neil can tap into that rich vein. And profit with the kind of individual goal that Jacob delivered to kick start Norwich’s new season in such spectacular fashion.

If Carlsberg did opening days of the season, etc.

Complete with the traditional unforced City error that will give the Scot something to sink his teeth into come their return to the playing fields of Colney.

Personally – and from a vantage point of great distance these days – I don’t think Neil has anything more to prove in the Championship.

He can do this level with his eyes closed. He is, indeed, a ‘natural born manager’.

And – wittingly or not – deploying his twins in the manner that he has still suggests a smart managerial mind at work.

His test is back upstairs.

Working with the older, broody continental types of which Seb Bassong is a prime example.

To go from a Norwich to a Leicester or a Southampton requires a different skill set than is currently required in the Championship.

Getting the Bassongs of this world to play consistently to their full potential.

That’s his challenge. Or, indeed, the club’s.

Right now, however, such issues are over the hill and 45 games away.

Right now, Neil has set out his stall bright and early.

Go young and hungry; keen and lean. 

Trust in those that have the confidence of youff to have a pop from 25-yards; in the top third of the pitch, where that ‘No fear!’ mentality matters most.

And in the returning Murphy twins he has two, young guns with everything to prove and nothing to lose.

As Rovers became the first to discover this season.


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Filed Under: Column, Rick Waghorn

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Comments

  1. Keith B says

    8th August 2016 at 10:30 am

    Amongst the various plaudits there is one key phrase that AN came out with about Jacob following Saturday’s performance:

    “He has got a really good understanding of how I want the system to work. ”

    That presumably is what has brought him to the top of the youngsters pile, slightly to our surprise.

    The interesting thing about the rise of both the Murphys this summer is that it comes hot on the heels of the acquisition of Sergi Canos. Despite paying quite a lot of money for him (£2.5m was it?) he appears to be down the pecking order for now.

    I have to be honest I assumed that we bought him because Neil didn’t think the Murphys were going to make it, and expected him to be in or very close to the starting XI. Maybe Canos thought that too…

    And what better way to gee up our home-grown pair than bring in to their home patch a young rival with, perhaps, a little bit of arrogance, and thereby challenge them to see off the intruder? I’m sure Canos will get his chance and come good in due course but for now it’s as though we spent that £2.5m on motivating our own players.

    And kudos to your mother Rick; I do know my cancers and holding on for 6 years, and hopefully many more, with that is remarkable at any age, never mind in your eighties. She’s clearly a hell of a fighter.

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