My Football Writer Norwich City news… comment… analysis
Norwich City – news, comment and analysis
It's probably safe to say that the short list for the 'hot seat' at Carrow Road got shortened by one after this defeat.
The same failings of the Grant era were visible, questionable tactics and a real sense of a team without a heart.
A lot of hope for our chances of climbing out of the mess we find ourselves in was pinned upon the belief that we do actually have a half decent team, it was just that they were being stifled from playing to their full potential by …
With no wins for over a month and no goals in more than nine hours of football – and most alarming of all no indication whatsoever that City might be about to prevent either of those two statistics from growing – prior to kick-off yesterday all thoughts and speculation concerning who is eventually going to replace Peter Grant, the AGM, Delia selling up or potential new investment could be put aside for 90 minutes.
Because the only thing of real significance to the Canaries supporters …
When Peter Grant took over the helm at Norwich City, the club's directors could have been forgiven for thinking they'd employed the man with the Midas touch.
Inspirational and passionate in his job interview, he backed that up with compelling evidence on the pitch. A 1-0 win at Birmingham City was followed by the same scoreline against early season leaders Cardiff City.
Two wins, no goals conceded; it seemed too good to be true. Sadly that proved to be the case.<br …
There is a certain rationale in assuming that as a result of the Canaries' woeful performance at Loftus Road in front of the live TV cameras eleven days ago, the subsequent dismissal of Peter Grant from the managerial hot-seat and the time that has been afforded to the players to re-group so to speak, it can only get better from hereon in…
But as we know only too well after harbouring similar thoughts after the Wolves debacle, Norwich and rationale simply do not go hand in …
For now – and events may yet change again in the next ten days – keep your eyes on events at the Reebok.
Because according to my pal oop north, Norwich and Bolton could “both be fishing in the same pond…”
Sure enough there's Paul Jewell's name is pretty near the top of the bookies' list given that he's about eight miles away on the back-end of Wigan and sat twiddling his thumbs; and there's Chris Coleman. Ooh, and there's Steve Bruce.
<br …
OK, here's an interesting one.
Let's suppose that the Norwich board are sat there today, locked on the horns of a dilemma.
Do they go all Micky Adams and go for the complete Championship street-fighter?
Or do they go all Pierre Littbarski and go wholly foreign and wholly unknown, albeit in the German's case with the very well-known quantity of Ian Crook at his side?
Both types – and there's half a dozen from each side of the …
Life is rarely dull for the City supporter, off the field at least. There has only been one topic of conversation over the last week and that's been the arrival of John Harston. Oh, and the small matter of Peter Grant's short and most disasterous reign coming to an end.
Once the dust had settled on the gaffer's inevitabel depature, the talk turned to who next? And the Stanleys are no exception. Hear their thoughts now in MFW podcast, it's FREE to download, but …
In fairness, I'm in no real position to offer anyone any advice about job interviews.
I've only had two in the last 15 years. And the second job interview I failed. More worryingly still, the interview I failed was for my own job.
So as the Canary board spend this weekend sifting through the latest list of runners and riders for the small and unimportant vacancy in their midst, I suspect that there is very little that I can offer by way of advice.
And …
Exciting isn't it? About the only good thing about losing a manager is that it leads to all sorts of flights of fantasy about who us City supporters would love to see at the helm of our beloved club.
So, at one end of the spectrum, we have: 'Come on Jose… if you really are 'The Special One', sort this lot out – we'll even chip in for the 'prudence with ambition' tattoo.
At the other, we have: Iwan for manager, Malky for coach, and Flecky for …
Get your head to the ground Ferret-style and there's only one thing that most people agree on – a date.
More on that in a minute. After that and this weekend, I hear, is the one where wheat and chaff go their seperate ways.
That the traditional list of hopefuls is replaced by a slimmed down list of genuine contenders among whom, you strongly suspect, will be names that no-one has either thought of or suspected. One of which may pop up later tonight.
So …
Farewell then Peter Grant.
You're a very good coach,
But a manager you aren't.
In the end, even he had to accept that it just wasn't working.
There are all sorts of reasons why it didn't work ? some of which he had no control over, most of which he definitely did ? but Darel Russell inadvertently identified one of the key mistakes while paying tribute to him:
?I don't think that by bringing someone else in, there is more …
Norwich supporters have always liked to have a little bit of a whinge, a bit of a moan. Don't get me wrong, it is all done with the right intentions and only because they love the club and after all, their loyalty cannot be questioned; if you sign up to be a Canary fan, then you have to expect a bit ? ok, a lot ? of heartache down the years, so who could blame them?
But some comments in certain quarters have wrankled with me a little after the inevitable departure of Peter …
So who next then?
No doubt the next few days will throw up a whole host of names as possible candidates to replace the departing Peter Grant, and no doubt many of them will be little more than names plucked completely at random as they often are in situations like this.
People tend to forget the small matter of the necessary qualifications that are required to manage a Championship club for example, so half of the runners and riders can be discounted for a start.
<br …
Peter Grant proved the adage that nothing becomes a man so much as the manner of his leaving. A decent man did the decent thing.
But the team he has left behind is grievously short of decent players and in genuine danger of relegation to football's third tier. Are Norwich too big a club to go down? Ask Nottingham Forest, Leeds or Manchester City.
Is the current team good enough to stay up? Not on recent evidence.
City have gone nine and a quarter hours without …
And so the reign of our own Bonny Prince Granty has staggered to its bloody and tragic end. An end that was about as glorious as listening to the last bit of air being squeezed out of a set of bagpipes.
Fatally wounded in the? ahem? battle of Loftus Road our brave wee Scot gave a “I can do no more, I blame the men? kiss me Duffy” speech and slipped silently away to die. Once more our fine City was without a regent and a bruising war of words and recriminations was about to envelop …
The day Peter Grant took over at Norwich, I spoke to a member of staff at West Ham. They were happy he'd got a manager's job but questioned whether he would be a success, giving the reason that he was such a nice bloke.
Strange, that. Particularly when you consider that over these last 12 months Grant has made David Brent look like a genius in man-management.
From slagging off the fans, to slagging off the club's best player, to slagging …
You're stuck in the proverbial mire, you've taken just eight points from your opening nine league games, you haven't scored in almost eight hours of football and you're currently in one of the relegation places.
So how did the Canaries react to the alarming situation that they'd put themselves in as a result of an abysmal start to the campaign?
Did they, for instance, dig deep in the manner a boxer would who is on the ropes and one punch away from being …
As had been anticipated in this column and elsewhere, City's visit to Loftus Road last night may well prove the end of the road for Grant with City residing in the non too lofty position of 22nd.
We are now staring down the barrels of what could well prove to be a long and grim winter relegation battle, with frankly no guarantee that we will win it. Although much thought and column inches will be taken up with the question of how it came to this and who to replace Grant with, it …
In the end, the simplest statement came from Peter Grant's own lips as he mulled over the 1-0 defeat by Queen's Park Rangers.
“I've no doubts in my abilites as a coach,” said the City boss, brutally honest till the last. “But to be in this situation in my first job in management is disappointing because you've got to manage players as well as coach them.”
And therein lies much of the problem. Management of 24-odd individuals under the …
It was inevitable.
Peter Grant himself admitted after the Canaries' dreadful performance in their 1-0 defeat at Loftus Road on Monday night that as manager the buck stops with him.
“It's a results business and we're not producing,” he said, “I take full responsibility.”.
The manner of his departure though spoke volumes for the man himself, when he revealed that it was his decision to step down for the good of the club rather than dragging his …