If the club is yet to reach the realms of a full-blown crisis, we’re most definitely in the midst of a bloody muddle.
What we were served up yesterday was football you expect from Championship perennials; those who have cobbled together a team of journeymen and freebies, and who will win a few, lose a few and bob along mid-table; the play-offs but a distant dream.
And in two years time that could be us – unless something changes.
The performance over 97 minutes was very ordinary but to then concede the sucker-punch of an injury time winner felt less sucker, more full-blooded.
And yet before a ball had even been kicked those of us with dreams of City dining at the top table had already suffered a sharp dig in the ribs.
Henry Winter’s interview in The Times with Delia and Michael, nicely written and intriguing as it was, was for many perhaps a little too revealing.
It portrayed their view on football and the progression of this football club as diametrically opposed to those who feel the only real option to advance in the modern game is to embrace it – however painful that may be. To fight against the cash-driven, cash-laden monster it has become seems futile, yet Michael and Delia appear determined to do so.
Jez Moxey too confirmed, in an interview with Radio Norfolk, that foreign investment is not even a consideration and so we find ourselves with the future prospect of the reins being handed to Tom Smith, Delia’s nephew. A lovely chap I’m sure, but one to lead us to the next financial level?
And while Delia and Michael remain: “We can’t on one hand [protest] that football’s being run from Dubai and Wall Street and then give into it.”
So, nothing doing here, like it or lump it – which is of course their prerogative.
And, for now at least, that’s not an issue. For the time being (for the next 19 months in fact) we retain a financial advantage over the majority of the Championship, although we will be joined next August by the three PL ‘relegatees’ from 2016/17.
[All of that of course assumes we won’t be achieving promotion this season, which… well…]
But the point here is we are slap bang in a window of opportunity that simply has to be seized. The parachute payments will be gone before we know it and to not squeeze every last drop out of them could well, as one Canary-Caller put it, ‘see us become the next Ipswich Town”. No-one wants that.
And which is why the current slide has to be arrested, whatever it takes.
Delia and Michael speak very highly of Alex Neil in The Times’ piece and few of us would argue against her assertion that he’s an intelligent man who was ‘devastated’ after the 5-0 drubbing at the Amex. But weren’t we all, and for us there is not a single thing we can do about it.
The Alex Neil of the 2015 play-offs I wouldn’t have swapped for anyone; even the Alex Neil pre-St James’ Park 2015 was right up there; but the man we see attempting to explain away the latest disappointment appears one made of very different stuff.
The 2015 iteration stood by his footballing beliefs, trusted his footballing instincts implicitly and could problem solve. The current version is wavering big time on the first two and is most definitely struggling with the third.
And then of course there’s a fractured, disheartened, disaffected dressing room to contend with; something he’s unlikely to have encountered before in his relatively short managerial career.
It’s clearly something that was never an issue at Hamilton; he was universally revered in his fist six months here; and even in the Premier League a failure to survive was mitigated by the size of his budget and the quality of his squad, and the players appeared supportive of him.
But now the cracks are showing and, in some cases, are threatening to explode into chasms.
Under the new Wolves manager we excelled by having a team that was greater than the sum of its parts. Right now, a team that’s precisely the sum of its parts should, and probably would, be good enough, but it’s not – and as a collective we’re clearly the antithesis of the former.
Yet the collective deficiency ultimately boils down to individuals and under-performance is something endemic throughout the squad.
Michael McGovern appears a shadow of the keeper that single-handedly kept the Germans at bay in the Parc des Princes; Robbie Brady a shadow of his Euro 2016 self; Timm Klose flounders where once he cruised; Alex Pritchard is almost unrecognisable from the player that tormented us in the red and white of Brentford; and Wes too has done little since that virtuoso performance against Rotherham.
The list goes on. And questions linger over the ability of those off the pitch to influence those on it, and whether Team Neil can reinvigorate and inspire those players to perform to a level that equates to wins and good performances.
At the moment there’s a rigidity and lethargy about the group that becomes all too obvious when faced with opposition who are fluid and dynamic. The passing becomes laboured, the movement barely existent, the minds clouded with doubt and the overall approach staid.
The upshot is a Preston, or a Leeds – the single highlight of which was a tremendous and heart-warming Championship debut from Louis Thompson.
So what now?
Well, more of the same simply won’t suffice. The board’s unequivocal backing of Neil needs realigning against the aforementioned window of opportunity, which will be gone in a flash.
We’re currently in the game of salvaging rather than building and they should ask themselves if there’s anyone out there better equipped to seize the current short-term opportunity.
And if the answer is yes…
What now indeed.The way forward has never been so obscure but if this manager is still here for the next game I would hazard a guess that Tettey will be back in place of Thompson…….,
Not all players are motivated by f.ing and blinding. A tactic of Alex Neill. What of the players we buy and don’t use, just crush there spirit. These current first team players seem to think they are something that they are not. It’s a shame we don’t have another team to support in the area then the board, manager and first team might lose their complacency
Alex neil is the worst man manager for a long time he crushes confidence out of players players who play well and instead of rewarding them with a run in the team drops them for his stalwarts who are not performing …and on from that his substitutions are dreadful normally (we normally concede after his substitutions)…also transfer wise we all knew we needed 2 strikers at least we faff around and finally get oliviera who he obviously doesnt deem good enough ..and also the centre back situation was never resolved .
I find the news about this tom smith bloke very very disturbing.
A head in the sand kind of fella …10 yrs of someone who isnt no good ..yeah right mate ,well done delia :/
The only Tom Smiths I’ve heard of made crackers. They had a poor joke inside too.
I must confess I have not seen the interviews with Delia & Michael and Jez but from this article, and other snippets, it seems to be confirmed what many supporters feel in their guts, i.e. consistent recruitment failings is not just about dearth of funds, it’s the club’s ‘Little Norwich’ mindset and creed. How many of us have suspected that should, by some miracle, Norwich City get promoted this season, the club would still not invest in the players to keep us in the top tier. It now appears confirmed. I’m sure, like many, I take issue with it being ‘their prerogative’ to do as they see fit and ignore fans aspirations. The current owners are just that – current! They are only custodians of the club for future fans and posterity. Norwich City is not their corner grocery shop to pass down in the family for generations to come. If they think that they will become as ‘popular’ as Blackburn’s Venkys. So is the players’ perceived lack of drive, enthusiasm, consistency and commitment to the Championship fight a resigned acceptance of the board’s modest view of Norwich City? Are the players, particularly the seasoned old guard, the up & downers, resigned to a lack of commitment and ambition from the top? If so, we can hardly blame the players for their lack of commitment to the cause. OTBC!
NCFC has a solid hard core of supporters year after year as has been confirmed by our visit to league 1.
Regarding the finance attitudes I think my wife (not a supporter) has hit the nail on the head.
With an almost guaranteed season ticket sale of over 20000 year on year why spend more and worry about the risk.
Little old Norwich can keep ticking along with all costs paid as we go.
Sometimes we can surprise a few (including D’S & WJ) and get our hands on a bit more money via an occasional year in the PL.
I feel that’s it for our future for many years to come unless Tom Smith when chairman looks for a new toy.
As Albert Einstein once so accurately said; “the definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
Nothing more to add!
Perfect summary. I also think that we the fans are not demanding enough and sometimes accept mediocrity. To applaud a team and manager that had been relegated after what was an awful season, gave the board the impression all was good in the world.
We have to accept that for the immediate and medium term our club will have a continuing dynasty which will mean same old same old. That doesn’t mean I ignore the excellent work that Deliah and Michael have done for the club in the past. Past being the operative word. We have a full house every week and a waiting list for tickets but I wonder how long this will be the case if we continue with this style of play and management.
It’s time for big decisions but I wonder if the board have the backbone to get out of the status quo and move on into the modern world of professional sport. I doubt it. Otbc!!!
Gaz (8) – Does that equally apply to writing the same stuff week in, week out?
If so… will get my coat 😉
The only surprising aspect of yesterday’s interview was the fact that it took place. It’s content merely confirmed what all sensible,supporters have long known. Norwich city is a personal plaything, to be used as seen fit by the owners.
To rail,against the premier league is one thing, but to ignore the fact that her shareholding has increased in value massively from participation in that league is hypocrisy.
The departures of McNally and bowkett, the latter in circumstances never fully explored by local media have left smith and her family and cronies in sole charge of the club. Yesterday’s interview was intended to let us know just that.
The insular statement about “foreign” investors, never would she even deign to speak to such people, flies directly in the face of somebody who pranced on television in a ” let’s be having Eu” t shirt. More hypocrisy.
Nailing her colours to Neil’s mast for ten years was inflammatory and quite ridiculous, particularly as the whole football world knows Neil is on the thinnest ice.
The rant seemed to take great pleasure in stating the imposition of her will despite the fact that the “supporters won’t like it” and smacks of the ludicrous search of all Europe for a new manager when the world class Neil Adams was in a cupboard at the training ground.
the air of resignation around the ground stems in part from the fact that people can see the writing on the wall. Swimming against the tide does not work, ever. If you can’t beat them join them. And from where I sat, Norwich city couldn’t beat an egg right now,
I was definitely a believer, but now the questions come thick and fast. Questions over selection, over tactics, over player motivation and man management.
More experienced managers watched Neil’s early season exploits with something approaching awe, then set done and devised tactics to stifle Neil’s team, and then Nick an unlikely draw or even a more unlikely win.
Sadly it would appear that it is currently ‘job done’ on Neil’s Norwich, and last months Manager of the Month, hasn’t been able to generate a plan B, falling rapidly from ‘hero to zero’
Can Neil put this right?
There is a growing feeling that our swash buckling hero’s inexperience maybe showing through the growing cracks.
Are our defenders that appallingly inept?
Have last seasons lessons been papered over and ignored?
Have the wheels come off a philosophy that says”concede as many goals as you like as long as you score one more than the opposition’?
Can Neil survive, and turn this round?
I’m still a fan, (if a now whilting one), but even I now have to recognise that maybe a more experienced hand is needed on the tiller.
Shame.
I hate to say I told you so, but I told you so!
Great article Gary.
It seems inconceivable with the supposed quality of our squad that these struggles are happening! However, it also seems that our wee Scots friend has a totally different dictionary to the rest of us. Wholesale changes were promised for yesterday, however, all we got was one enforced due to Tettey’s obligatory suspension, and Brady replacing the now “tired” Jacob Murphy….hardly wholesale in my view, although I thought Thompson was absolutely superb and showed so many qualities which are currently sadly lacking in so many of his peers. No doubt he will be replaced by Tettey for the next game as he will need to be eased in gently! We currently have a defence which cannot defend; a mid-field which cannot defend; create or score, and an attack (Jerome…) who has to feed on ever diminishing scraps. Hoolahan (why, oh why all the unremitting praise??) and Pritchard CANNOT play together in the same mid-field in this division. It is far too physical for two players of their stature..one is almost a luxury; to play two against any team except perhaps a very poor Rotherham suicidal. And why, with so many midfielders on the books, is our only attacking thought to welly the ball as far forward as possible, and hope that it’s close enough for Jerome to chase? That’s certainly not the type of football I was brought up on at Carrow Road, nor do I wish to see it nowadays. Also, has anyone any idea of our squad’s fitness levels which appear lacking combined to all those sides I’ve seen at Carrow Road this season? To concede so many late goals is little short of criminal for so called professionals…
OTBC
Two candidates who can organise teams are free right now:
Sam Allardyce
Roy Hodgson
I’d take either right now
Gaz (10) no mate – just on the pitch, the touch line and the Boardroom
Delia came across as arrogant in the interview, ‘we get enquiries, we take no notice’ – So much for certain posters who claim they never get any.
The board should be running a corner shop, not a professional club. They are amateurs.
As for Neill, he looks totally blown. The team has a desperation about them and it compounds what I said a few months ago that they club we naive in thinking they could essentially get them up with what got them relegated.
NCFC is a mess, on and off the pitch. Who is going to sort it out, because when it comes to Delia and Michael, indecision is final.
No surprise to hear Neil criticise Thompson for a goal in his post match. Paving the way for the pedestrian tettey to slip back into the side at his expense no doubt.
Thompson and lafferty should be shoe ins for the team sheet next time out. The only two players who can be satisfied with their efforts yesterday.
I cannot claim to be surprised by any of the news,event and game over the weekend. I and others knew when we started the “worthy Out” protests we should have carried on until Doncaster and the Cook were removed from this club. There are others like me who have been going for many many years (53 in my case) we know only fully too well what years of nothingness is about.. Had Delia had a clue to such times she might view things differently. But her money is paid back now the profit is being made and believe me they do make a nice sum. She will be happy for her little Norwich to stay exactly that. And there isn’t a thing we can do (ask a Blackpool fan what that feels like) Sadly this is my last season, I cannot warrant putting that amount of money into a club that is run by people with no ambition or care for the fans of the club. She talks about how the fans are badly treated by clubs over TV, yet the prices at Carrow Road are one of the highest in the championship and higher than some Premiership..
In the terrific TV series, Game of Thrones they speak of the invisible many faced God. Ours isn’t invisible she is alive and doing very nicely thanks
Canos,Naismith,Lafferty,Pritchard,Oliveira,Mulumbu,Whittaker,Bassong,Turner: nine players(most of whom bought at considerable expense) on high wages, yet how many games have they started? That’s almost a third of the squad! Our starting line-up includes at least 3 players who don’t want to be here (Brady, Klose,Olsonn.) Promising young players are left out or loaned out. Is it any surprise we are sfruggling? No!
Following the criticism in the local press after last weekends result, I felt the article was carefully orchestrated to try and get the national press on their side. Hence the reference to the “whingers” wanting to get them and Neil out when 4th in the league! With just one win in eight against teams in the top half, and that was at the beginning of the season when we could keep clean sheets, Delia will come to realise that action will have to be taken. But that might take some time as, according to the article, she switches off when it comes to money. It seems that until persuaded otherwise, her decisions are made purely on sentiment!
Interesting point, Peter. But I can’t remember when the national press were ever interested or onside in matters pertaining to Norwich city. To me, the whole thing resembled one of her rants, when she tends to let herself down and reveal rather more of what she is actually thinking than she would like.
I simply fail to see how anyone can think that the smith ownership model can continue swimming against the tide of money that even mediocre clubs in the championship are now enjoying when the dirty premier league money runs out. What do they think is going to happen? Given her relative self confessed pauper status very little I suspect.
I for one am not prepared to see her make a stand for her principles by taking Norwich city down the toilet to prove a point.
I also find the alex neil is so intelligent comment hilarious if he so intelligent why isnt he learning by his constant mistakes maybe it because delia isnt that bright herself lol
Get big nigel pearson in he’d rattle this lot into shape including delia !!
More likely end up with Nigel Kennedy.
Delia can afford to be critical of the Premier League when in recent seasons they have been giving her big fat TV cheques every year.
But her complacency may be shaken in two years when the parachute payments stop.
It will be back to a model of regularly having to sell the best players just to balance the books.
OK we’re on a bad run lately but I find these attacks on Delia quite distasteful, and unwarranted. I don’t understand the logic in the claim that she’s only in it for the money, and is happy to stay in The Championship. Surely if personal wealth was the motivation she would be using the club as leverage and gambling her way back to the Promised Land, as has happened elsewhere?
To me the balance of the side doesn’t seem quite right at the moment. The defence has been too exposed, Lafferty’s goal was the only one we’ve scored from open play in 4 matches, and we aren’t creating many chances either.
Add to that players low on confidence and prone to individual errors, and you have a problem. But it’s NOT a crisis. Yet.
27) you are right, every time it goes wrong or off course the distasteful anti-Delia stuff comes out. If any other chair/owner had’ve said what she did we’d all be applauding them. People seem to forget that Swansea (our ‘model club’ not so long ago in most fans’ eyes) were locally owned for many years – now they’ve sold out, look where they are.
The problem is not Delia. She’s been in charge for 20 years and we still consider ourselves a top club (or feel we should be) based on our ability to challenge. The real fight/problem It’s having a manager with true conviction. AN is not one. Adams was not one. Lambert was – so much so he did this club proud and then had enough conviction to think he could do better. Even Hughton was one – but had too much conviction. We all thought he was the natural successor to Lambert. We need a manager with the gravitas to take on a club with a good record over the last six years – a club ready to make the step to mid table prem. A manager with belief and conviction. That isn’t Alex Neil anymore.
Personally I’d much rather have a fan in charge of the club than an outsider who see’s Norwich City as a vehicle for their own ego. When half the Premiership are owned by billionaires then a billion pounds doesn’t get you much further than being a middle of the table club.
It’s untrue that we don’t invest, we just have wasted an awful lot of money on players that either don’t perform or that Alex Neil has bought yet doesn’t trust to play.
Let’s enjoy being different to the rest. Local ownership and an amazing fan base
I think we are reaching a tipping point. It has become more obvious year by year, that to a) get into the Premier League and b) survive and ultimately prosper will take money. It will take far more money than Delia has. That inevitably means that we are being condemned to a life, at best, in the Championship. But worse, we will not be able to break into that cycle because of Delia’s refusal to put the club into the hands of someone who has the ability, and finances, to achieve the progress that most fans want. That is rank unfair on the majority of fans.
How can anyone state the problem is not Delia and then list all of her managerial,mistakes and shift the blame on them?
And as for most fans wanting to be Swansea, thats ridiculous. I’ve never heard any city fan say that we should model ourselves on them. Quite the opposite, under lambert we had an Indian sign on them and beat them regularly only to see them take all the praise from the media.
To then chastise Alex Neil and call for his removal flies in the face of what smith said in her interview where apparently the man can do no wrong and has a job for the next decade.
Don’t let the facts stand in the way when defending Delia smith against all comers.
Let’s define the “problem”. Alex Neil is not a manager with the conviction to run a club of our size and should be removed. The person with the power to remove the “problem” disagrees and instead purports to keep Neil in situ for ten years. How then, is smith not the problem?
Alex Neil at Norwich for 10 years. !!!! personally Delia I wouldn’t give him more than 10 minutes. Just time to clear his desk. His record since Wembley is awful. Not just the results , but the charge sheet includes poor team selection , tactics , substitutions & his record in transfer market. There seems to be an underlying stubbornness with a misguided loyalty to certain players , the refusal to change tactics or formation, & the treatment of players like Lafferty. Why has he never accepted that Russell Martin is not a natural leader ON THE PITCH , that playing one up front won’t work with a striker in the CJ mould. , & accommodating favourites by playing them out of position undermines team spirit & causes friction in the dressingroom. Well Delia it’s coming home to roost now. The fans are not happy , it would appear by performances that the players are not happy & if our decent down the table continues the bank manager will not be happy. Perhaps then you will face up to the fact that things need to change. Trouble is it may be too late by then
So many people haven’t read her quite properly – she said she’d love to give a manager 10 years. Not that she wants to keep him in for 10 years. Honestly…
And you can’t say Delia is the problem because of the bad managers she’s put in place over the years – because by that standard, Lambert, Hughton & Neil were all good st the dreary of their tenure. And we believed in them. And for better or for worse have kept us as one of the top 20-odd clubs in the country for the last 6 years, which frankly is about as good as we can hope for a club of our size stuck out on the arse of the UK with an owner with relatively little money. Doesn’t mean we have to like it or be unambitious but stop deluding yourselves that a) a sugar daddy is out there and b) that’s ever likely to change.
City fan , all you say may be true but that doesn’t make AN a good manager. My problem with him is that after promotion last time there were missed opportunities to establish Norwich as a secure PL side. As it is ( if we continue with the present management team ) we could be stuck along with the likes of Ipswich in the middle of the Championship for years to come. Regardless of the wealth of the owners we should aim higher than that given the financial position we are ( should ) be in & the superb fan base we have. That’s something the likes of Ipswich do not have
Cityfan (34), not sure what you mean by “were all good st the dreary of their tenure”