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We had a win/win situation, though not for those that thought staying up after the first promotion was the be all and end all. We took a complete risk free gamble on the first promotion. We rightfully weren’t prepared to put the club at risk. We signed a bunch of players on loan from around Europe who we *COULD* have bought with all those lovely pennies, but luckily we didn’t. I’ve said it to you before, but I don’t recall you complaining about those signings at the time - only with the benefit of hindsight. But that’s not the point. We essentially mugged the Premier League of their money for a season and came back down knowing we had a great chance to come back up again this season in a far better financial position. Sold 2 of our youth assets for a very good wedge on top of that. Now we’re looking good to go up again. No we won’t spend the figures Villa and Sheff Utd have. Covid has played it’s part there. But I bet we spend more than we did last time around. This is a very savvy way to essentially maximise our chances virtually risk free. A fantastic creative model brought in by Webber etc to counteract not having a super rich backer with a bottomless pit. Quite obvious what Webber and Farke etc are doing, and it’s very clear they knew exactly what they were doing upon promotion the last Championship season. If we stayed up, massive bonus - we went down, then we take 1 step back to go 2 steps forward. They’re executing the self sufficient model brilliantly, and that’s how it’s going to be so best get used to it.

Surely the only relevant point here is as a club, have we improved or got worse since this model came into play? Even if like @king canary you only focus on the football, where are we now under this model compared to before? If we just take football, I personally think: - We've built an identity which we've not had for the 10 or so years preceeding this model - We've built as good a squad as I've seen in the past 10 or so years preceeding this model - We've had the best influx of academy players as I've seen in the past 10 or so years preceeding this model - We've either been challenging for promotion or in the Premier League. Then on top of that, we've also: - Developed players of value significantly higher than anything in our history before, and continue to do so - Developed the academy in general with a clear route through for younger players, an obvious advantage when not having huge sums to spend - Improved the bricks and mortar - impressive training facilities at Colney which now add as an attraction players signing rather than the opposite. So for all the complaints about not spending last season, in my book the clubs in as good a position as it has ever been. As far as i'm concerned I don't really see what the problem is.

Your best post to date in my opinion 🤪

Heard he broke his hand signing the contract and will be out rest of the season 😢

Imagine if Eddie Howe was still there and they were pushing for promotion? What with his boyish good looks , ready wit and the whole cottage industry story of Bournemouth . Rags to riches . Plucky Southcoasters. Jumpers for goalposts . Is it ? (shhh don’t mention the massively rich Russian bloke though )

Just a shame for you that this has nothing to do with Brexit you buffoon.

its

There seem to be a number of people who want to relegate us again before we've even been promoted. If and when we go up, and I fully believe we will, we will have a summer window where we know the PL money is guaranteed to improve the squad, and you can be sure that Webber knows we need to improve it. The finances already appear to allow for more to be done than 18 months ago. We will need to keep most if not all of our stars and add perhaps 5 players to have any chance. If say Max, or Emi, goes for £35m then that will allow us to bring in perhaps 3 or 4 players of the required quality both in terms of fees and the required wages. We need to get this job done first and then worry about the PL. Almost all of our squad turnover always gets done each summer under this leadership. Stop worrying about next August and enjoy what we are doing right now because it has been a remarkable effort. I've seen a few comments on Farke being naive. I suppose if you play attractive football and lose, that's what people say. If you play like Hughton and lose, you get called negative. In the end the results are what matter. But there is no question in my mind that the way Farke has built our pattern of play provides a basis, the best we've had in a long time in my view, for us to succeed. We don't need to throw away Farkeball in the PL, we just need to get better at it.

It’s a shame you have to, GPB. I swear the 8th modern wonder of the world is Norwich fans who think Todd’s an average player. There is no way Todd Cantwell is anything less than the very best attacking player to come through our academy since Craig Bellamy 25 years ago. And like Craig, he will only get better and better. These could be our last 20 or so games left with Todd so enjoy them while you can!

A Premier League team would have been 1up after 30 seconds on Saturday

Omg, all the Soccer Saturday pundits will be predicting automatic promotion for them now 😉

Got my vax appointment for Saturday morning👍😀

Farke has always praised how he is behind the scenes so I reckon he may stay as 3rd choice while transitioning towards a coaching role.

Also with the off field strategy as well. I would suggest that promotion in 2019 was a little ahead of schedule, so we had the choice of steady long term progress, or some reckless sht or bust gamble. Thankfully we stuck with the former, and we are in a relatively comfortable place financially. Youth players are being developed, along with various loanees. The football has been very pleasing to watch, and promises more Supporters may bemoan us not playing in the PL this season, but there hasn't been any loss in seeing PL teams at CR, or supporters being able to travel to PL away games either. So all in all maybe a few of the usual suspects might care to trust the club a bit more, and not clog up the forum with constant whinging about how bad it all is - as it really isn't. Not at all.

With the greatest will in the world, I don't think McGovern is good enough to be our number two in the top flight. Last time we bought in Fahrmann to compete with Krul and had McGovern as third choice; if we do keep McGovern on, you'd think it'd be as third rather than second choice. Whether this means they see Barden or Oxborough as good enough to be a number two, or if we bring in a new number two and send the kids out on loan, remains to be seen.

Nobody cares you boring, whiny old troll.

No one is saying that. The point is that COVID happening made our transfer strategy even more justifiable - albeit in hindsight. We accidentally incorporated a transfer policy which perfectly served us through the pandemic. If Webber had known COVID was coming we probably wouldn't have even have done anything different because there was already such little outlay! If we'd spent money then we may have come to regret it as we most definitely would've still been relegated but with an even bigger financial short fall to overcome.

Once upon a time, being moved to the non-football section would have been a guarantee of life long anonymity.

He lives in the Phillipines

@king canary I was sort of in the same boat as you last season, I felt like we could've spent more without setting ourselves up to fail in the future if relegation transpired. The fact we attempted to splash £16 million on that French winger on deadline day in summer also kind of suggests that there was money available, but for whatever reason it wasn't spent. There is I think a valid question as to why we waited so long to make such a sizeable bid, and why other targets weren't considered etc. Something which I think a lot of posters forget when sticking up for the lack of spending. But as it happened, the decision to take an approach as @Alex Moss describes proved to be the correct one, albeit due to various circumstances, most of which hit the club as a total surprise so an element of fortune to that for sure; No amount of signings (realistically) would've overturned our injury crisis The need to make up for the financial impact from COVID The extra funds were used to completely clear our past debts and ensure an optimum position for this season and thereafter The mental impact the lockdown had on us and the lack of fans etc killed our season stone dead I do feel like the terrible end to last season is perhaps sticking out in your mind. Up to the pandemic we had been really competitive in lots of our games, just beating Leicester and Spurs in the cup, we were being described as the ''best ever side to be in 20th''. It was by no means an embarrassment up to then. For whatever reason post lockdown we waved the white flag, which was a huge let down, but that IMO is not a reflection of the self-sufficient model at all. We just bottled it. No excuses, completely pathetic end, but a fresh slate this season and we have seen a complete turnaround in fortunes. Because of the circumstances of last season as mentioned above, I am very reluctant to agree that we have hit our ceiling. We will spend more next summer if promoted, we don't need to balance the books or sell anyone, the impact from COVID is no longer a surprise and will have been factored in. We just need to skirt another injury crisis and I think we will be able to compete, though it will of course be a huge struggle. Your view that no team is successful without spending is a bleak thought, but really we are the only side in recent years to even try it. So we have a sample size of one, and a season peppered with bad fortune. And I certainly wouldn't say that take translates to the championship. When us, Leeds and Sheff United got promoted for instance we had spent a pittance between us! Webber and Farke have already shown that we can punch way above our weight with literally no finances and a remit to slash down our wages and sell off key players like Maddison. Let's see what we can do when we have a much better starting position, more resources available and hopefully no unforeseen hindrances along the way!

So the vaccine minister was interviewed on Sky and BBC breakfast this morning, lots of useful updates (cynics might say it was a good time for him to put his head above the parapet, with things going well on the vaccine programme....) Capacity continues to expand with 10 new mass centres opening to give 17 now, but the plan is to extend this to 50 Ditto with pharmacies, another 63 are being added to the vaccine programme this week. 24/7 vaccines are going to be piloted this week in London. However, the main constraint is supply of vaccine and he said deliveries will be "lumpy". I take from this that we may have periods when vaccine centres simply don't have enough vaccine to use, so daily levels will fluctuate. All care home residents/carers should be done (or at least offered the vaccine) by end Jan Top 4 tiers should be completed mid Feb Over 70s are now being offered the vaccine in some areas - this is in areas that have done a high % of over 80s so clearly makes sense. Once the top 8 tiers are completed, these cover 99% of covid deaths so far. Israel shows good reduction in serious illness and hospital admissions from their advanced roll-out. No promises on when restrictions can be relaxed. He said to allow 2 weeks for the Pfizer vaccine to give protection but 3 weeks for Oxford (I hadn't heard this before). September for everyone to be offered a vaccine is achievable (I think this is over 18s). Once the top 8 risk tiers are completed, it will be down to the JVCI on the phase 2 of the roll out, his instinct was that it should be offered to police, teachers etc in priority as they have to come into contact with people to do their jobs.

It'd better be! I've got moussaka and stuffed vine leaves ready for my dinner and am planning to smash the plate afterwards.

This is the sort of stuff that winds me up a bit Alex. I don't have zero patience, I'm not obsessed with instant gratification. What I want is to feel that the club is geared towards being the best it can be on the football pitch. All your green ticks are again related to finances, which is all well and good but I don't watch games to feel happy about how much profit we've made. I personally don't take huge pride in the fact we sold Godfrey for £25m for instance- I'd much rather he was a Norwich player, the money just offsets the disappointment of not being able to watch an extremely talented player in yellow and green anymore. Right now, it feels the club is geared more to being a financially stable, self funding business rather than actually being the best it can be on the pitch. You're happy with the model and the ownership and that is your prerogative. But I'm tired of the insinuation that people like you who 'grasp the bigger picture' are somehow smarter or better fans than those who think last season was pretty pathetic and don't want to repeat it.

Learn to love the yoyo. Think of the season after next 😁👍

Out of likes Mr C, but indeed. Ironically, one of our worst periods in recent history was after loosening the purse strings. Sure, it could have gone right - but the point is, it didn’t. It really couldn’t have gone more wrong in fact. And we paid for that price for some time to come afterwards big time - in fact we are only just coming out of it now. So a bit too fresh in this clubs memory for those that spend their days behind the Carrow Rd walls. You can certainly understand the cautiousness. But we’ll done Ed Balls for instigating the new approach for the club. He set the ball rolling for Farke and Webber, and should be commended. Anyway, this obsession to just throw money at everything to solve problems is just silly. This is not monopoly, this is real. The bottom line is 100% this - it’s not about how *much* you spend, because that is irrelevant - it’s about how *clever* you are with the money you’ve got, whether that’s £1mill or £100mil. Emi Buendía - 1.35million€ initially or something crazy like that. Pepe - 72million€. So let’s concentrate on clever recruitment first and foremost, because that’s where it’s at. But in case it’s going under the radar, it should be pointed out that Webber is already preparing for the next phase by showing he’s now prepared to gamble that little bit more, but still within our current means. And it’s a step up, and on players that should be able to do the business in the Premier League. Already there’s Gibson and the Greek lad - there’s 15 odd million or so right there, all being well. But don’t moan about this ambition if those players don’t work out - the club is trying its best. So, to summarise, we are clearly preparing to show more financial ambition this time around should we be promoted. But I think some of us folk on here listened very carefully to Webber’s and Farke’s visions the first time around, so how this is all playing out right now is no real surprise to be honest.

How much for this old table, Fiona?

Hello . I didn’t think we had said enough about Cantwell this evening - so thought I’d say this. Again.

The best players will usually move on - not always, though. We kept Hucks, Hoolahan and Holt in recent years. Others only moved because we couldn't afford them (Ruddy, for instance). Relatively few moved because we needed them to move to get the transfer fee; most move to better themselves. There isn't a team in the UK who can keep a player who can move on to a better team - even Liverpool and Man Utd lose players to Barcelona or Real Madrid. We can't ignore where we are in the football pyramid but what we can do is make our club one of THE places in the world that people want to buy young and upcoming players from. Like Southampton used to be before they decided to virtually can their academy. Players like Soto and Silani have joined Norwich City for a reason. If we go up will it be any different? Doubtful that most of our team will be that different, but I can see the likes of Dowell, Placheta, Sorensen etc stepping up a level or two. We have to concentrate on what we can do that others can't - Chelsea are struggling to replicate a little bit of our type of plan because they have to win trophies while they are doing it. For that reason, the rest of the top 10 or 12 in the EPL also can't do it. They try to buy young talent for £20m because they can't wait for their own academies to produce players. Hudson-Odoi on £100k a week hardly gets a game. He's financially set for life, an England player, but as a footballer his career is going nowhere and in 20 years time no one will remember he existed. Think Jack Rodwell, Scott Sinclair etc - what a waste! Jack Clarke at Tottenham; Daniel James at Man Utd - the wrong moves for both of them, with agents who don't act in their clients best interest. Man Utd have dozens of 19 and 20 year olds on their books who have never got near their first team, in the hope that just one might one day show something. Those players could join clubs like ours to develop so that when they're 23 they can slot into that first team, having shown they can do it at the top of the Champs or the bottom of the EPL. That's what we do. Josh Martin and Matthew Dennis used to be at Arsenal, but they couldn't give them the development we can. Both will be worth millions in two or three years time. We've bought Mumba, Adshead, Fitzpatrick, Mair etc because they will develop into proper players. Some won't even make it with us - but lots will. Is it enough to make us an "established EPL team"? I don't know - but it's probably the only way we can be one, so let's have a go. That's what I call ambition.

Great to hear WBB, it's so gratifying to see this unfold everyday, please don't stop updating this thread until we are well out of lockdown and maybe onto just the occasional bit of news about your "yearly 9annually modified) C-19 jab".

Not exactly a difficult job though, is it Bill, we have a couple of case studies on here.

I think the bigger concern is that premier league sides would not miss the gilt edged chances we still allow the opposition in every game. We have been incredibly lucky in a few recent games where the opposition have missed sitters, the first minute on Saturday and the last minute missed by Barnsley and QPR particularly spring to mind.

Premier League players are now so good that they're in a better position TWICE. (We've got no chance 😉 )

What's a green shield stamp? 😉

I didn't get a letter Barry, my medical practice phoned me this afternoon and made the appointment for me. I wondered if they were filling in gaps as they run out of the over 80's. It must be a massive logistical exercise but it appears to be working o.k. Lets hope they don't run out of Vaccine.😉

We have three good young keepers on the books, all 20 or younger. They are clearly keen to bring in another keeper so my money would be on McGovern for another season as 3rd choice. Then send out the youngsters on loan to get the much needed regular game time experience.

I am sure Rupp is ours. Duda was on loan. But overall you are, to my mind, correct.

I'm firmly in the 'anyone but the Bucs' camp now. I like Arians but I really dislike Brady and I think Antonio Brown is a terrible human being.

This is pertinent point - Mark Moore, manager of the Dartmouth Crab Company, said his business and others were protesting to "raise awareness" of the impact of new border checks. He told BBC Radio Five Live his company had faced delays of up to eight and a half hours when delivering produce into the European Union. He added that the situation was "especially difficult" for the shellfish sector, where goods were at risk of going off before reaching customers. "It's not about the increased documentation per se," he said. "We have taken that on board, and we ourselves - and I know many others - have had no issues with producing the actual paperwork." "It's the volume required and the timeframe in which to produce it, which doesn't lend itself to live shellfish and fish generally." In short their business isn't now viable selling to the EU from outside the SM or without a deal at least similar to Norway (inside the SM). Who would of guessed that ?

here he is

Video for you https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-55706114

I don't recall any of the clubs who spend big going to the wall though.

Main page has said that he has completed his medical and now completing his 5 day quarantine, so you can probably get back to work haha

You can already start to see 2 types of (once) Brexit voter emerging - and we're only 2 weeks in - give it 3 months for the problems to well and truly 'bed' in. Those that are starting to sheepishly admit they've been had (i.e. the fishermen - many more to follow) and those too proud to admit it as they go bust. I suppose there is a third set - like SC that never ever understood what they voted for and still don't even when they get it.

Bluto Blotto

Can't speak for others but what I enjoy about sheffield United this season is seeing how the posters who wanted to be them last season stay well clear of these threads.

Aha Hahahaha yes! I forgot about that Mr Lawrence/Laurence! I was laughing my head off too 😂😂😂 ’And now they’re bringing on, just to slow the game down, one of their young defenders Andrew OHMaaah...? Andrew OHMaaah...?...Medaallli...? Ohmmaaa...MedDELLION? Medah...lion? Yes, they’re bringing on, is it?, Andrew OHHBAAAAMAH MED DHAAALLION BAAA MAAA DELI ANDREW OHBAAMAA-MEDALLION! is poised to make his exit and come all over the pitch, I tell you these boys have played some cracking stuff, and Ohh! Have you ever seen that before Dai!, Cantwell’s got one orange boot on, and one blue boot on!, the cheeky scamp with his hair tied back, he’s been everywhere today!’

You think her tats are bad you should see her piercings! 😉

Yes - I was going to say exactly the same thing. Over the last couple of seasons Wilson's name has cropped up on here quite frequently as someone people would like to see come here on loan - yet he has been totally outshone by Cantwell in both the games against Cardiff - and as you've pointed out, he's been booked in both games for fouls on Cantwell.

RIP Sylvain