Guest Blog

Fans and journalists alike are now able to post and comment on games as they happen on social media and decisions made by officials can be instantly dissected by the armchair fans who are able to see snippets of controversial incidents (and goals) on the plethora of sports apps.

My own first game was fairly inauspicious. Aldershot at home, 1984, the start of the glorious Milk Cup run, and a tepid 0-0 draw that left me with not one memorable passage of play. But it didn’t stop me falling in love. 32 years of season tickets later I’m still here. Just.

It does not bode well for the future. We can’t keep up with the Jones’s while we have to live with the Smiths. The ambition factor is lower than the proverbial snake’s tummy and we are stuck with it. When the parachute payments disappear we will be well and truly sunk.

One thing I’m sure of is that we are lucky to be in the league position we are in; we have conceded when we should have closed games out, had moments of switching off, defended badly and missed clear chances at the other end.

Alan Bowkett quit, soon followed by David McNally. The questions are floating around still, but quite naturally confidentiality means there will be no answers. Two extremely astute characters who are unfortunately no longer with us – in the NCFC sense.

The fact is – and a fair few Canaries fans would do well to remember this, especially those calling on ‘the board’ to ‘show more ambition’ by ‘loosening the purse strings’ – that money has always been the overriding concern in professional football. Usually other people’s money and how to get hold of more of it for yourself.

More strikers would spoil the broth. We must give Alex time to strategise and coach Murphy-Murphy-Hoolahan-Pritchard-Canos-Brady-Naismith into exactly what is expected of them in each position in the three behind Jerome-Oliveira-Lafferty.

I can’t see anything that would lead to a ‘demonstration against the board’, unbelievably planned for before the Cardiff game. Kids, eh? If they think this is bad, I wonder how they’d have dealt with the end of the Chase era?

Alex likes youth football and we will hopefully encourage bringing players up through the ranks. Also, hopefully, whoever new CEO is, he/she will look at this area and continue it as it looks like we may just be starting to produce some bright young stars.

I’ve only actually watched one PL game in three seasons – a terrible 1-1 draw with an equally fearful Swansea, enlivened only by a wonder goal from the much underrated and ill-used Gary Hooper – but from a distance it hasn’t look like much fun.

I think we know we have got what it takes to be a bigger club. Colney will be undergoing a refurbishment in the summer and we have now appointed a head of recruitment, which I feel is where our failure to strengthen lies.

I hope we stick with this formation. It’s a case of players in correct positions and there’s proof it works. No more need for shoe-horning in players, except of course in the case of injuries. And I’m hoping Redmond’s knock is nothing too serious.

We will never be one of the big clubs; I am not sure that I would ever want us to be. Big bucks in football changes a club. Aa generous benefactor would be more than welcome at Carrow Road, but would we still be able to remain the same family-friendly club that we are now?

We’re often linked with big names, while knowing either the wage structure here isn’t going to make it possible, or we’re too far from the bright lights of London to make the move attractive (do they not know the A11 is now dualled?). But the hysteria is now not a small circus on screen. Instead it’s a big top on social media.