Let’s not pretend.
We’re Norwich City fans and we’re hurting. It hurts that we got relegated. It hurts that we had ten games when football resumed, and lost the lot.
It hurts that the verve and belief, which had helped us win admirers and overachieve for much of the past eighteen months, has gone.
It hurts that in the end we were relieved that our visits to Chelsea and Man City only resulted in a 0-6 aggregate.
We’re not in the mood to hear excuses and perspective.
Let’s set aside excuses (though surely no-one could claim Lady Luck was remotely on our side this season).
As serious fans, though, perhaps we should have a bit of interest in perspective. Is Norwich City back to where it was after relegation in 2016, or when Stuart Webber and Daniel Farke arrived in 2017?
Whatever the answers, they have implications for our club’s future and what we can look forward to.
In part, we’re dealing here with an issue of short-term versus long-term. Gary touched on it in his recent piece: “There is a case to argue that the long-term plan is being executed at the expense of the here-and-now”. Many fans, even if they share Gary’s acknowledgement of there being a long-term plan, will now be feeling the same.
Let me offer a couple of thoughts. They may or may not be convincing, but perhaps they’ll shed some light on the issues.
To understand where Norwich City now stands, we have to go back just over a decade. To say that our club has had ups and downs since 2009 would be the greatest of understatements. As fans, we’re acutely aware of fluctuating fortunes on the pitch.
Behind the scenes, though, it’s been no less dramatic.
In summer 2009, our financial prospects as a club were as grim as our morale after relegation to League 1. The following years, orchestrated by David McNally, were an astonishing turnaround.
Another turning point, though, came in 2016. In an attempt to hold on to our place in the Premier League, we pushed the boat out – especially in the January window with the acquisitions of Timm Klose and Steven Naismith. It enabled us to be more competitive than this season, and almost succeed.
But it didn’t succeed – and the legacy proved horrible when we didn’t bounce straight back. However well intentioned, the Premier League contracts were a millstone round our necks, and by the time we changed structure and brought in Stuart Webber, it was one of those situations where the Irish advice would be: “If I were you, I wouldn’t start from here”.
We had to sell our best player (James Maddison) for as much as we could get, the money basically staving off administration. Adding to the frustration, we had little alignment between who was earning most and who was contributing most. There was no possibility of making much-needed investment in our infrastructure and training facilities.
Why does this old history matter? Because of Stuart Webber. One of his characteristic mantras is that he wants to leave the club in a stronger state than when he arrived.
Yes, we could have spent some more money on players last summer. Perhaps not as much as some fans believe – there are many calls on the first tranche of PL money, from hefty bonuses to extra contractual payments to other clubs (eg Emi Buendia’s, but also relating to years of earlier business). We also chose, this time, to invest in upgrading our facilities.
But we could have spent more – potentially increasing the chance of staying up, while definitely increasing the financial risk to the club.
I’ve heard fans say “We should have spent a lot more – even if we’d still ended up going down”. Stuart Webber would strongly disagree. He’s bound and determined not to leave his successor with the kind of position that he inherited at Norwich.
If Webber’s perspective is right – or at least if it’s going to hold sway at Norwich for a while – does that mean our Premier League stays will inevitably be short-lived? Here’s the big thing for me: the answer’s no.
Everything in the long-term plan (actually it’s a medium-term plan, but in football there’s short-term and anything else) is geared for Norwich City to be able to compete in the top flight.
For various reasons – some in our control, some not – it didn’t happen this time. But the promotion of 2018-19 allowed significant changes to be made in the club. All our legacy financial issues are settled. We have training facilities that help our coaches do their work, and help us attract new blood (three of our new signings have already mentioned the facilities as an attraction to them).
We have a Head Coach whose speciality is taking raw talent and moulding it into effective presence on the field. Our first-team and development squads are now loaded with such talent for him to work with.
If we sell players this summer – as of course we will – it will be on our terms. Unlike two years ago, we’re financially one of the strongest clubs in the Championship.
Of course, there’s the little matter of getting back to the Premier League. As Gary rightly said, it’s a short time for Farke to shake out a losing mentality and instil a winning one. History tells us not to underestimate the challenge.
But we have many of the tools. Let’s hope that one of them – the presence of our fans at Carrow Road and beyond – is available to assist.
Hi Stewart
An interesting read whilst hearing the PM Boris has curtailed all test events, so stadiums will continue to echo ot the sound of silence.
Both Webber and Farke both have 2 years on their contracts, so in reality not long to get all their plans in situ. Webber did say after signing his last extension that he wanted a challenge, possibly overseas, but was asked could he see himself staying at City longer and said you never know what will happen.
City sometimes reminds me of Gt Yarmouth, living in the past having once been the top fishing port and top 3 tourist resort, it never thought it would end so never invested or looked for investment to take it forward. Mid-sixties was the oil boom and yet again never really invested in it, so it moved on up to Aberdeen, now they have the Wind Farms and all that goes with them, but will it create more investment or stagnate till the next chance to kick start investment?
We have dedicated owners who admit they can’t financially support the club and have openly said they will ensure stability by handing over the club to their nephew, who will not be able to support the club financially.
The conclusion is simple – sell a large chunk of your holdings to a suitable investor, due diligence tests are a must. Yes, there are more con-artists trying it on than preferred owners, but the risk has to be taken at least.
Newcastle’s takeover has collapsed yet again and all you read it how bad their owner is, yet he spends on average £50m each season on players. There are no depts and the stadium is at capacity every home game, 2 relegations in 10 years both with immediate promotion – what more do they want? I would be happy with that.
Hi Alex,
Back in November I queried in a well known newspaper why Newcastle never seemed to achieve very much, this was Tooncgull’s response, reading again it has a disquieting familiarity:
Ashley has hoiked out the innards of this club, and left a shell. There is no joy in the club, no ambition other than to live down in the murky depths of the Premier League, feeding on debris and hoping each season to JUST do enough to stay above that dotted line. The club had been relegated 4 times in 110 years before Ashley took over.
Since 2007, he managed that twice more, whilst presiding over a club whose stated ambition in the cups has been a brazenly public ‘Lets Not Bother”.
“lets not Bother” seeps like puss from every part of the club under Ashley. Lets not bother challenging higher up the table, lets not bother trying to keep key players , lets not bother trying to buy players over a certain age, lets just not ****ing bother being a football club at all.
Im 56, have supported them since my first visit to St James park in 1969 (and probably before)…. and yet I’ve never felt so alienated and numbed by it all – we’ve been worse, 1980-81 for instance, mid table Div 2, with top league scorer Bobby Shinton on 7 (seven) goals and the team creeping above the 30 goals for the season mark on the very last day.
But this is now a Zombie club. Ashley has been taking the P for over ten years now. its not Bruce’s fault, its not the players fault. The sooner Ashley sells up and goes the better.
The reason I mentioned Newcastle was really to show that Ashley’s supposed worth £3.5bill doesn’t do as Roman Abram does at Chelsea and use his own wealth to buy success.
Ashley purchased a club that was in financial difficulties and since similar to city has made or tried to make them self financing, he has bought players and sold most of them at a profit to help buy more players.
It also shows that their supporters will never be happy unless they get a Saudi or Qatar Prince who will throw money at them no matter what that country’s human rights are.
As supporters we are all wanting a successful team as long as it is someones elses money, Spurs have the best Staduim possibly in the world at this time, a top 6 team and their supporters are calling for Levy to go he spent £130m last summer so when is it time for owners to leave to me that is when the club stops to progress just like city
“The conclusion is simple – sell a large chunk of your holdings to a suitable investor, due diligence tests are a must. Yes, there are more con-artists trying it on than preferred owners, but the risk has to be taken at least.”
Alex B, the owners have consistently said, from every early on, that they neither want their money back, or seek to make a profit from their shares. They’ve also indicated that the preference was for new capital injections, via the issue of new shares. Combined, that makes your suggestion highly unlikely.
So with what you have said we might as well give up trying to be successful and accept being a medium sized club with no ambition till the relegation money runs out and we are stagnating like Ipshite in league 1.
Under the present ownership we might as well support Yarmouth Town or any non league club at least they show ambition to get to and stay in a higher league.
All the happy clappers and Smith supporters should realise that to survive any business needs investment not a shares issue that are swallowed up by the current board that openly admits they can’t finance a football club.
Lets say thankyou for saving the club but it is time to go not hand over to a nephew that can’t afford to finance the club either
A lot of things would be easier, of course, if we had an owner with deep pockets and a willingness to empty them for the club. Especially if – like Bournemouth – they were without principle and happy to smash the rules in order to get promoted.
It’s harder for Norwich, and for anyone else with integrity. But I believe you’ve missed a point of my piece. If we get it right – above all, if we can get another promotion now – the work of the past two-and-a-half years means we’ll have far more to spend on our next attempt to stay in the Premier League.
Hi Stewart.
No I understood your point but I was trying to say is that as hopefully a progressive club with ambitions we can’t rely on the zipper effect or going up and down to make ends meet, Charlton tried it in the early days of premiership and look where they are now, but we also don’t want the overspending like Leeds and many other clubs so a medium needs to be found and that might come with more outside investment
Very good article Stewart. If I remember rightly, it was meant to be a five year plan, culminating in promotion to the Premier League, but we achieved that goal three years ahead of schedule, so within the original plan, we’re still on course to succeed.
Before anyone accuses me of being a “happy clapper”, I’m not happy that we didn’t stay up having got there, but there were a number of factors contributing to our demise. The injuries (particularly the Zimmerman one at Wet Spam, which should have resulted in a red card for Haller, but didn’t even warrant a free kick in the eyes of the referee and VAR), VAR’s introduction in a bastardised form, and the Covid, (when we’d just beaten Leicester, and may have started to get a bit of belief back) all had their effect.
As I’ve said before, I’m not against a change at the top, providing it’s the right one, but how do you ensure that?
Great piece Stewart.
You have put things in context, something as a fan it is hard to do !
The end of the season was awful, even the most pessimistic supporter (yes I am looking at you cousin Dave) would not have predicted we would lose all 10 games during Project Restart. But we did. And it was bad, very bad.
But lets all look to the future, it seems the club have already taken on board criticism regarding lack of pace and physicality in the team, though I am sure Stuart and Daniel saw this way before us.
Some very exciting young players have been signed.
It is true Stewart that a lot of money has been spent on the training ground, which is some much needed great news.
But there is other great news this time round as there are no Mr Naismith, Mr Jarvis or Mr Wildschut to pay off. Financially we are in a far better place with this relegation than the last.
I also believe neither Watford or Bournemouth players had relegation clauses in their contracts. They will find life back in the Championship a massive culture shock.
Finally the board, my opinion for what its is worth is Delia should be open to offers as we are now competing with billionaires and half billionaires. Manchester City have proven FFP can be circumvented with clever accounting, if we want to really compete we may have to look elsewhere for investment.
For all the good news I have put a “spin on” that Trump would be proud of, to be a self-funding club without parachute payments would likely need a £20-25 million player being sold every close season just to balance the books.
However I cannot agree with some supporters, like Richard Balls who promise Premier League and European football and all we have to do is persuade Delia to leave. Everyone is entitled to an opinion but if Delia were to sell up it would not guarantee a massive change in our fortunes to say that as a fact is disingenuous. .
An excellent article Stewart and brilliantly sums up the mood of the majority of NCFC fans whether they got to CR, or follow Chris Goreham on Rodeo Norfolk. IMO, SW has got it exactly right and as Df has said ALL the players who signed extended contracts last summer were aware of the consequences and as DF has said, ‘no one was holding a gun to their head’ when they signed.
I was reading an article re an interview with Max Aarons and he has said that all the reports of him moving anywhere are complete speculation – no $hit Sherlock!! Any club seriously interested – bidding STARTS at £20M according to SW and if CR is his home ground net season – that’s fine by him.
5 out of the last 10 seasons in the Prem is not a bad return. It is just we tend to go up and down more than similar clubs who stay up longer – but then stay down longer. One only has to think of Leeds, Sunderland, or Coventry as cautionary tales. I am just hoping that we are going to sell big and come back much more prepared for a real tilt at the Premiership next time. The lower half of the Championship is not something I aspire to and Norwich have been the dominant footballing force in the region for over 30 years now and it is about time we really made it count.