How do we break this cycle of argument, conflict and division?
It’s been said that the friction and conflict within the Canary faithful is reflecting division in the wider world of politics and society.
I’m not so sure. In fact, the closer I look, the more I reckon it’s the other way round. Political and societal conflict is more acute than usual, but our fractious state as supporters is more like the norm.
Somebody once pointed out to me that when Liverpool ruled the roost in the Eighties, you wouldn’t have known it from the pronouncements of their fans. The team was sweeping all before it, domestically and in Europe, but in the letters pages of the local paper you’d find almost nothing but criticism – team selection was wrong, tactics rubbish, recruitment a shambles.
That’s shocking but perhaps not surprising. I’ve been the reading the Pink Un since the Sixties, when I’d walk up to Gorleston station (after Doctor Who and beans on toast) to be there for the seller with his bike and bag.
I can’t remember a time when the bulk of correspondence – letters then, postings now – wasn’t negative. From Bill Punton to Jacob Murphy, Lol Morgan to Chris Hughton (sorry, Hooton): we’ve found reason to have a go at all of them.
On this site, thank goodness, we manage to debate civilly. Robust discussion and argument for sure, sometimes with frustration, but without personal abuse and rancour. Maybe that’s a slight throwback; if so, a very welcome one.
I had a minor but unexpected difference of opinion last week with my mate Robin Sainty. He’d written a typically thoughtful piece in the EDP, arguing that with all the change in process at Carrow Road it would be better for us to stay in the Championship this time, re-group in the summer and be ready for a concerted promotion challenge in 2017-18.
While that’s eminently sensible, at this stage I’d hate for us to accept staying down. The erratic form of teams above us has opened the door a crack. I’d like to see us throwing everything at that door, trying to knock it off its hinges and force our way into the play-offs.
Maybe we’d be better prepared next year, but there’s no telling what Fate has in store. With the best-laid plans, we could be blown off course by injuries or (very likely in my view) a more competitive Championship with stronger teams.
In any case, whenever we get back to the Premier League we’ll need to use a big chunk of the income to strengthen the squad (i.e. what we failed to do in summer 2015). However smart our recruitment this summer, we’re simply not in a financial position now to build a PL team.
So my view is: grab any chance at promotion.
Some of you may be thinking this is all academic: given City’s away showings so far this season, there’s no earthly reason to imagine a sudden burst of verve and belief.
Our general response to finding the promotion door open, you might say, has been to close it politely and tiptoe away.
You’d be in good company. When I told my wife I was planning on going to Villa, given the key importance of the game and the chance to put pressure on the teams above us, her response was one of irrefutable logic: “Isn’t that what you said when you went to Sheffield?”
It was accompanied by a familiar look. The one that says “Do this if you want, but don’t try to kid me there’s any sense in it”.
It can be terrible when your wife understands you.
Back to my original question. Yes, fans always love a moan about their club – but this season at Norwich has clearly been more fraught than most.
Underperformance on the field, exacerbated by the awful Jez Moxey interlude and apparent inaction (which we now know wasn’t) from the Board – a poisonous mix.
That’s now behind us.
As I write this, Stuart Webber isn’t yet confirmed as Sporting Director but it seems in the pipeline. That means we’ll have appropriately skilled people in the two key roles of MD and SD. People can see action, and it makes sense.
Hopefully that will buy the Board some breathing space, at least a wait-and-see attitude from fans. The Head Coach appointment may test that, if it’s an unfamiliar name as David Wagner was for Huddersfield fans last summer.
A final word. I appreciate this isn’t a financial advice column, but I have to share with you a sure-fire money-making scheme.
Every July Gary Gowers has his writers make their predictions for the forthcoming season. Using mine, you could make yourself a few bob. You just have to make a slight tweak to my forecasts.
Last season I forecast Leicester to go down from the Premier League; this year (not paying enough attention to Stuart Webber) I predicted Huddersfield to get relegated from the Championship.
Simply turn my predictions on their head, and you’re onto a winner.
You heard it here first.
Does the final piece of advice apply to everything you write too?
To say that the club is on the right track is nicely optimistic. So far, announcements about future structure are all we’ve had, save for the appointment of a Managing Director with someone who had already been doing a very similar job within the club. We look like we’re going to have Huddersfield’s Football Director as our Sporting Director; I appreciate that Huddersfield have been impressive this season but they’ve hardly pulled up any trees in past seasons (I don’t know how long Webber has been there). We don’t have a manager and, whilst we don’t have a SD this situation will remain. The only way we will be able to say that the club is on the right track is if we’re playing in the Prem in the next couple of years.
I agree that we should go all out for promotion now. However, the defence that can’t defend set pieces or the back post is still in place. The management team (minus 1) that has been unable to put out a consistently impressive team this season are still putting out the team. The players who have been flaky away from home all season do not inspire in me the thought that they may have found some new resilience post Alex Neil (I wonder who is looking forward to a few beers in the Belfry on Friday night).
I would love to see our season extending into the play-offs but really can’t see us finishing above 8th. If I am right about this I will look forward to next season in certain optimism that we be fantastic, the management restructure will have been an outstanding success and that the Yellow and Green Dream Machine will be sweeping past everything that’s put in front of it.
Totally agree, Stewart.
We follow sport (yes, football still is) because of the competitive battle to achieve something.
There is nothing worse than throwing the towel in and accepting there’s nothing to play for – you might as well spend Saturday afternoon shopping or midweek watching TV Soap.
We’re fortunate to be in a position where winning the remaining fixtures may well see a top 6 finish. The players and fans should be really up for the run-in, especially with a chance of the impending arrival of a Webber / Rosler dream team.
Apart from a crack at another trip to Wemberley, and a chance to top up the coffers again with another season in the Prem, we’ll have an excuse not to go shopping or fixate on cr*p TV.
We’ve certainly got fuel left in the tank, given the casual trot that most of this season has been played at. Now that Mr de-Motivator has gone, let’s hope the boys work up a sweat to impress the new coaching team and summon up a sprint towards the line.
IF we can get a coaching team such as Webber / Rosler in place in time, some of us may owe an apology to the Smiffs come end of May. If…..
Steady On, Now’s Our Chance
Stewart: I too have happy memories of the halcyon days of the Pink ‘Un.
In the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s I lived in Blofield, and the paper was always for sale in Blofield United’s Clubhouse not long after six.
If City were at home I’d stop off there on my way home, pick up the paper and have a quick pint.
If City were away and I didn’t get to the game I’d often watch Blofield – complete with toddlers – and have more than a quick pint while waiting for the paper to appear while watching Paddy and the Blofield lads going up and down like a seesaw as the Combination results came in over the radio.
Good old times.
Jeff #1: Touché!
Don #2, Azores Canary #3: Well made points (both for and against me)
Martin #4: Simpler times?
Stewart,
My sister waited for over an hour at Gorleston library to get us the ‘Bly, Bly Babes’ Pink’Un when we beat United in 1959.
The only way we make the play-offs is if Alan Irvine improves the whole team’s approach to defending. But as he came in to help improve that – at least, that’s how many perceived it – I’m not greatly optimistic.
It doesn’t help that it looks as though Wes could be out, Diljks is also unavailable for a while and there’s a shortage of variety up front.
I remember the Pink’un on a Saturday evening. I used to get sent to the chippie in Harleston to buy our supper and I think it got sold there as it was the only place open at that time of night in those days.
Great Pink Un memories! Keep them coming
#5 Stewart: Simpler times? Yes indeed. And good ones too.
There was very little “Faster” then and maybe the world was better for it. My kids would doubtless disagree.
Of course we should not be content to leave it to next season, although I admit our chance now of promotion this season is virtually nil.
Who knows who of our better players will be sold before next season starts – Howson, a Murphy?
The three teams being relegated from the Premier will have a much bigger budget than us.
We’re relying on a new ‘team/club spirit’ (and ‘structure’) to bring us to success!
Stuart – You say the Board have not been inactive, but I cannot think of anything very beneficial they did all season before March.
Howson has, so far, shown no sign of trying to force a move. Perhaps he recognises his own limitations, i.e. a class Championship player, but a struggler in the top division. Any move he made to the Premier League would almost certainly be to a struggling club.
Perhaps if Leeds win the play-offs they might tempt him back, but other than that I think we will still have him next year.
And delighted as I am by the Murphys’ progress this season they are 22, which is comparatively old for players in their position to break through. My feeling is that if they really have the talent to play more than a bit part in the PL they should already be there. They are less than a year younger than Redmond – look how long it’s taken for either of them to make the England U21s compared with him.
And Pab, whilst the three teams relegated will almost certainly have bigger budgets, it doesn’t mean they will use them well. They will also have their own want-away equivalents to Brady and Olssen and a few like Klosse who can’t take the hurly-burly of the Championship. There’s no reason why next season shouldn’t be similar to this with 1 or 2 of those relegated struggling to make an immediate return.
Pab #10: As readers will know, I thought (and still think) the Board should have dismissed Alex Neil before Christmas.
We now know they did think seriously about it, and decided to stick with him at that point. Meanwhile they were also working on other, perhaps deeper, things. A change of structure doesn’t get planned and implemented overnight.
They also had to reassess the appointment of Jez Moxey and (more easily said than done) decide they’d been wrong and take action to put it right.
If we’d have revamped our squad at the start of the season, I’d say staying down was not the end of the world.
Staying down now just means less money and the same old squad.
So as things stand we could use every penny to start afresh. So if there’s a chance for promotion we should grab it.
Dave B #13: You know, it might be more interesting if we didn’t always agree…
#13 – Dave B. The difference between last summer and this is the number of players out of contract – just two senior players last summer; closer to ten (although some have options) this time. At the very least that should give a greater opportunity to refresh the squad.
We are not getting promoted the season because our away record is so poor and we have not currently got the management to motivate our flagging squad of players, too many of whom are working their ticket. Plus the way the entire aspects of the club have behaved this season, they do not deserve it.
There is nothing to be optimistic about. That may change, but I think us Norwich fans are being led a very merry dance by a board that says it wants PL football, but the reality is they want a set-up to be a comfortable upper Championship Club. We’ve got Stone as M.D – which was internally agreed ages ago – and that’s it. No manager and no D.o.F. Great.
@15 – Not sure why we couldn’t have revamped the squad last season. Tell the players in the last year of their contract that they won’t be renewed and they should look for offers from elsewhere. Yes, they might not get the same wages but they may get a 3-4 year deal. Even if we let them go on a free we’d have been in a better financial position. We may not have moved them all on, but you’re telling me we couldn’t have moved on Bassong, Lafferty, Mulumbu and Whittaker, all who clearly have no obvious future at the club.
Instead we gave Whit’s and Jerome extensions, bought and sold Canos, sent a decent keeper out on loan, while acquiring another two, and sent out on loan a number of other players who we could have started to build into the team, and kept a bunch of players we never started.
Not to beat up on the departed Neil, but he really had no squad management skills at all.
#17 – Dave B, you can tell a player with a year left on his contract whatever you like, if he doesn’t want to move (even on a free) the deal doesn’t happen.
Some may find it hard to believe, but our players, even after relegation clauses, are still, typically, paid more than a typical Championship wage and therein is the main problem. Young and hungry they’re not.
BTW, I agree with you on Whitts and also find it hard to believe that we also gave GON an offer too.
Dave B: The first point in Gary’s response (#18) isn’t just theoretical. It happened with our players last summer and again in January, more than once.
@Gary and @Stewart
Sometimes I think you guys get caught in the mindset that because something happened, that was the only way it could have happened.
Absolutely, those players had every right to stay on a good salary for one year. But even a 30% pay cut to go somewhere else on a 3-4 year contract and actually play football would have sounded good to some. Yet we’ve both paid their wages and lost all transfer value for, from what I can tell, every player in the final year of their contract except Olsson.
If you insist on collecting turds how much do you genuinely think someone else will want to buy them? They’ll always be turds. Our problem is we’ve collected quite a few over the years and all they’ve done is got stinkier.
#20 Dave B – you’re seriously suggesting we can offload a bunch of 30 something’s on three / four year contracts, with just a 30% salary reduction – most of whom a clearly not “fit for purpose” in the Championship.
Never has “the optimist” been more inappropriate