Well who was happier with that result then – I’d guess neither Antonio Conte or Daniel Farke really wanted a replay?
However, we acquitted ourselves pretty well against a Chelsea side that although it featured several non “first choices” still contained some rather famous names – the likes of Pedro, Willian and eventually Juan Morata.
A slightly thin crowd enjoyed the sound of the Chelsea fans venting their frustration, no injuries (at least that I could see) and a sound defensive performance featuring a back three, which worked. I get the feeling we might see more of this, at least against the more footballing sides in the Championship. That means it’s sure to be 4-2-3-1 against Ipswich!
In fairness we never really threatened to conjure a winner and I don’t see Stamford Bridge as a venue where we can reasonably expect a result, but it’ll be a fantastic night out for the hardy travellers and our London-based supporters.
The Maddison-Pritchard-Murphy triumvirate functioning as a top three is something I think we might see more of too. Especially if rumours surrounding possible departures for CamJam and Nelson have a vestige of truth in them. Your guess is as good as mine.
Anyway, that’s about as much as I can wring out of a 0-0 draw featuring two largely redundant goalkeepers, so I’ll just draw a line under it by saying this spat between Conte and Jose Mourinho is getting tedious, despite some of the tasty verbals floating about between them.
So, on to the love-hate thing that is the dreaded January transfer window. I am not a fan, but I don’t make the rules, obviously. I could accept it more readily if only the close-season window ended on the eve of the Big Kick-off. That would seem eminently sensible to me.
We have a raft of possibilities, but how much will actually happen?
As it stands, Russell Martin may be in line for a loan move, possibly to Rangers.
We may contrive a miraculous deal in which we can hive off Steven Naismith to Kilmarnock, maybe in return for the Boy Jones. I think Stuart Webber and Steve Stone would have to do a modern version of the loaves and fishes to make that one happen, but stranger things have occurred.
Apparently, there is interest in Jerome and Oliveira – if both went, surely at least one striker would have to come our way in recompense to Farke’s squad. It’s interesting that we have experimented in playing without either. To counter a Chelsea 3-4-3, or to prepare for February 1?
Timm Klose is an enigma – if somebody from the lower echelons of the Prem came in for him, surely he would leave to enhance his chances of playing for Switzerland- in the World Cup… but if not?
Paul Jones has gone to Exeter, Sean Raggett is back with us – for now.
Remi Matthews, Eboue Adams, Adam Phillips, Ben Godfrey and Carlton Morris are all out on loan. I feel Matthews and Godfrey at least can expect first team football at Carrow Road next season. The imminent departures of Angus Gunn and Alex Tettey will see to that.
Marcel Franke is loaned to Dynamo Dresden and Louis Thompson may, I stress may, be back next season. Poor sod; what a terrible injury to sustain. As for Matt Jarvis, another one well and truly crocked. I wish some people would get off his back. No, we should not have signed him on a permanent, but the situation is hardly of his making.
We’ve heard nothing definitive about Tom Trybull signing a new contract. Fair enough – sort it out first, tell us afterwards. Fine by me.
Which brings me to the obvious ending: Pritchard and Maddison. They are absolutely bloody crucial to our medium-term future. Both of them. But what kind of offer will turn Webber’s head? And who will be whispering extremely loudly in his ear with a diktat?
It’s truly in the lap of the gods in both cases.
Anyway, plenty of time to see what transpires. We’ll all be theorising and talking about it for over three weeks yet
Finally, well done Madders. If you’re going to start a serious collection of swapped shirts, why not begin with Pedro!
What exactly is Matt Jarvis’ injury problem? He could have had a whole body transplant by now and be back playing. I do feel sorry for him though, Do players still have insurance policies for career ending injuries, which is surely the case here although, of course, I’m no doctor?
Thanks George – very interesting point.
Back in the day (ha!) both the clubs I played for had a very basic block policy which covered every player signed on and registered with the (amateur) league. What this covered I do not know as luckily none of our lads ever had to put in a claim, but it was certainly paid for by the clubs.
Two of my mates were self employed in the building trade and took out individual insurances, principally against loss of earnings. I did this too for a couple of seasons as I also played for an uninsured works side in an unofficial friendly league on Hackney Marshes. Dodgy pitches!
How it works in the professional game today I too am unsure; I am equally unsure that Jarvis’ injury is defined as career-ending, and if it isn’t I doubt there’s anything to claim for.
Like George, I’d love to hear from somebody who knows how it works.
The fayre we have been served up this season this little highlight against a second string premier league side is a bonus that has been sadly in short supply. It would seem Chelsea did get a shock, as listening to Cahill weep a little about another game (sob sob) to play, they or at least he expected to brush us aside like an annoying fly. I didn’t say wasp as we did lack a sting.
I feel that was our best chance of a cup run gone, I cannot see them being embarrassed or caught out again with a flat display. especially at home.
On to the guessing game of the transfer window. Why are we not allowing Russ Martin to leave instead of a loan deal. it is clear he doesn’t feature in Farke’s plans, the guy has been a very good servant to the club. His honesty at times has been refreshing, but his better days are behind him. I feel he was on the end of abuse far too much, others around him were deserving of their share. I feel we should give him a free as a little way of thanks.
As to Jarvis, it is bloody sad for a footballer to be so injury prone , why that should be , I’ll have to leave to experienced insiders. Had he been able to stay fit he would have been an asset for sure, I have seen enough of his past efforts for others to be assured of that. it isn’t as if he sets out to be crocked every 5 minutes. I feel for him as a player. Not his fault he is one of many mistakes that have been sanctioned by past managers
At this moment I would cash in on Oliveira , his head is not with the team and I am convinced he is at some sort of logger heads with Farke. I personally would not sell Jerome , the guy although not being used, is the best work horse for the front line we have had since Holty (minus the amount of goals) The prices I have seen quoted is £1.5 mill , you are hardly going to get a replacement for that who will give that work rate.
To Pritchard and Maddison Huddersfield have opened the door for others to see how we stand on him, an offer of around £10 mill may just clear the hearing of Webber . I do not know the lower leagues to be able to say there is a replacement out there. It is 100% sure that we have nobody to give what he brings to the team, he will be very hard to replace.
Maddison is a unique talent, who in my view would gain far more from staying put for at least another season, a lot will depend on how he feels, does he want to be a major player in a smaller pond or the opposite at a bigger pond. ? But we know bright lights and mega bucks turn heads , and common sense goes out of the window.
Interesting time , I hate transfer windows I have mostly been left feeling as flat as a cow pat, I do believe that many of us still believe we are a selling club at heart, despite the utterings, they always have been right from my early days at Carrow Rd, watching Ashman and Morgan’s teams battle away.
Probably more so given the need to draw money in.
Names are starting to float to the top of players we thought to be interested in, one said to be watching from the stands was , ADO Den Haag full-back Tyronne Ebuehi.. Then Kilmarnock winger Jordan Jones. perhaps Naismith could be used. but £9 mill is a lot to more or less give away. Plus Forest midfielder Jorge Grant, if he is wanted by a rival then can anyone seeing Forest playing ball on that one.
Anyways like every other window, we wait and see, nowt we can do only voise pleasure or not.
Happy and healthy New Year Martin and the rest of the writers
“we are a selling club at heart,”
We’re a buying club too. Like you I remember the Ashman/Morgan days. Ron Davies, Hugh Curran, Mike Kenning, Bill “less hair than the ball” Punton and many others were bought and sold. That’s how it works.
I can understand fears that we will sell Madison and Pritchard. But behind those fears there seems to be a belief that we will never buy anyone with talent again. Sure, if we got £20m for them it wouldn’t all go back in the pot. But some of it certainly would.
Pretty much agreed Keith. But if as you suggest we got £20m for this particular pair, we have already laid out £10m to get them in. Plus big style add-ons for Coventry in the case of any Maddison sale.
Now after you’ve put amount x into Delia’s self-financing pot, how much does that leave?
Probably exactly one tenth of the £20m.
What are you going to buy with that?
One Marcel Franke and you’ve basically sp*nked it.
I’m no economist but I bet I’m not that far out.
Yes, there will certainly be some big add-ons for Coventry if Maddison’s sold. Probably the same with Godfrey and York, Raggett and Lincoln, maybe Abrahams and Orient too.
But the £10m we have laid out has already gone, as has the millions we paid for Naismith, Jarvis and everybody else, regardless of whether we get millions for them or diddly-squat.
I’m really making the point that people always forget when they deride us as being “a selling club”. Nearly every talented player we sell is someone we bought first, or paid to develop in the Academy which is a sort of internal purchase.
I agree that we won’t re-invest as much as us fans would like of any funds we get, but we’re surely not going to stop doing what we’ve always done and keep recruiting players for development. In fact having we just done that with a greyhound from Ireland?
There was one period when we didn’t seem to do that so well, which is why the likes of Chris Llewellyn managed to make over 100 appearances for us, when now I suspect he’d be lucky to get to 20. I really hope we don’t go back to that.
I think our greyhound from Eire may well turn out to be more of a lurcher, but I’d be happy with that as I’m part Irish and therefore know a good lurcher is worth its salt.
Greyhounds can be prone to injury. Don’t worry I’m not talking that up for the lad Power, I’m sure he’ll be just fine.
We certainly are doing all we can in terms of getting some young guys in to develop – more in terms of sheer numbers than I can ever remember in nearly 50 years of support and well done Webber & Co for that.
I’d better not say too much about Mr Llewellyn, but when St Peter opens the gates Oliver Reed, Peter Cook, Richard Harris and maybe even Princess Margaret will be there to welcome him.
They’ll be there to greet me too, along with one Henry Weston, but I’ve never been a professional footballer so in my case it doesn’t matter:-)
HNY to you too Lad.
I think the trouble with the Naismith situation is that the money we spent on him is gone, dead and buried. “Cut your losses” as considerable as they are has never been more appropriate.
I once bought a Jaguar XJS – 5.3 litres of brutal power on the flat. It had a bit of rust when I bought it – which I knew about – and quite quickly developed serious transmission and then suspension problems. The guy who sold it to me knew what he was doing, I am sure.
So in the space of a calendar year I lost two grand on the wretched thing. That’s what happens when you get big headed and pay too much for something past its best. Despite the financial loss I think I must have bought half the Coltishall Red Lion a drink in celebration the night I got rid of it.
This isn’t exactly one of Aesop’s fables, but I should have taken my mechanic mate with me in the first place. Ed would probably have stopped me from buying it.
Which roughly equates to having a recruitment team at NCFC that is fit for purpose and not letting some eejit like me buy something on a whim. Here’s hoping we’re getting it right at last!
I think the draw against Chelsea was better for us than them, I hope DF plays a strong side again at Stamford Bridge… start the penalty taking practice now. Hopefully, the window won’t have dismantled the squad too much by then.
I was impressed with Godfrey and Morris for Shrewsbury against Wetsham. Godfrey especially looked like a player who would look good at the level we’re playing in, a team captain of the future.
Congratulations to Mark Robbins at Coventry; their fans have been treated with contempt by the club’s owners for years.
Godfrey did indeed look good against Wet Spam.
Paul Hurst wouldn’t have been a bad shout for us as manager imo, but having said that I think I might have to borrow Gary’s much-vaunted tin hat.
Totally agree with your Coventry point – sometimes when we think we’ve got it bad maybe we should check back and get a little perspective. There’s bad and then there’s rotten…
I’ve ‘half-joked’ before that Farke would play no strikers if he could get away with it, and then it happens! Murphy wasn’t really striker in his variable 5-5-0 formation, but I can see his thinking behind it (if ultimately a futile one in the longer term) but it was certainly worth a go in a game nobody expected us to win.
With Nelson disinterested. Jerome maybe looking elsewhere and Watkins not fit for purpose, Farke may be trying to phase out the position of centre forward completely and when we are in our ’80’s and bedwetting in our retirement home, we can laugh about the days of the ‘striker’ and what used to be 🙂
I love the way you call it 5-5-0 – sounds like an old steam railway engine wheel configuration!
There’s a serious point in there as well of course. I don’t see the purpose of Watkins either.
As for your care home observation (I bet I’m older than you) I think I’ll go for domiciliary instead. At least that way you can wet your own bed if the State doesn’t snatch it from you:-)
Re. Jarvis – I know some fans can never resist labelling players with persistent injury problems “sick note”, I remember the same thing happening to Louis-Jean, the full back we swapped for Gary Holt. But I think most of the criticism now is really aimed at the club for offering him a permanent deal.
From what I can glean online the problems he arrived with related to his knee. His later problems seem to be with firstly his hip and now his “malleolar” – which is something to do with the ankle,
http://www.transfermarkt.com/matt-jarvis/verletzungen/spieler/15921
It’s easy in hindsight to say the club were “incompetent”, “clueless”, or whatever abusive adjective you want to send their way out of sheer frustration. But life just isn’t that simple.
McNally was CEO at the time, Hughton the manager. They will have taken a lot of advice from the medics, and one presumes that advice was that he had a good chance of overcoming his problems. I don’t see how they could be expected to predict future problems with different parts of the anatomy. We were in the PL at the time and Jarvis had proved he could play to a very high level there so even if there was a risk, for £2.5m I can understand why they took it.
People in managerial positions have to make judgements all the time about this sort of thing, and sometimes they take what they probably perceive as a calculated risk. You will never, ever get them all those judgements right. Inevitably we only get to hear about the ones that didn’t pay off. If you recall, we bought Pilkington when he was recovering from a seriously broken leg; if that wasn’t a big risk I don’t know what was.
As for Jarvis himself, he appears to be a well-educated guy, part of the PFA management team, and there seems to be an academy bearing his name. If his playing career really is effectively over – something he will of course be reluctant to accept – then maybe he has a future in coaching, with us perhaps. Right now though I would imagine he’s utterly frustrated, and sick of not being able to do what he really wants – i.e. get out there week in, week out, plying his trade.
KeithB
Matt Jarvis was signed on loan on the 1 September 2015, then signed full time in the january window 2016 by Alex Neil . not Hughton
Oops, time flies when you’re getting old! I’m glad someone’s awake.
Thanks Lad – I didn’t realise that either – although I’m hardly surprised.
Funny how Neil’s doing better at Preston where he has precisely NO money to waste.
History.
Hi Martin
On the subject of insurance I have read that once the player excepts an insurance payoff then he is banned from playing football at any competitive level, There has been a few players that have taken thst route and afters time found that they have recovered enough to play again and even past medicals the stumbling block to them returning was firstly they had to pay back all moneies received from the insurance claim and secondly no insurance company would cover them due to the possibility of a new claim later down the line and thirdly any company that would take them on the premium was extremely high.
Transfer Window Rumours
1) Naismith has said he will play for free to go back to rangers (so he excepts city to write off any
possible fee)
2) Nigerian right back city may sign him as a pre contract as he is out of his this summer
3) Midfielder from Forest hard to see unless the new manager is told to sell some players
4) Devante Cole son of former Man United Cole fleetwood fans says he is a good player Sheff United
and Wednesday plus a few other championship clubs have scouts at most home games looking at a
couple of their players nothing can be done at present as the Chairman/Owner stranded in the Haiti
on a cruise due to the bad weather on the east coast of America.
If we have a possibility of signing a couple of players with no sales where is the money coming from?????
Totally agree. He really has suffered the most unholy trinity of injuries.
I believe it was a serious hip problem that finally ended Hucks’ career.
Jesus knows – I broke an arm, both ankles and three ribs just at amateur level and only one of those injuries wasn’t basically my own fault in some way anyway.
There isn’t a footballer in the land who wouldn’t rather be on the pitch than on the treatment bench.
And that includes Matthew Jarvis.