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Because we’ve had the double done over us by our relegated compatriots. We play nice stuff when we’re able to dominate the ball, which we’re able to do in this league, but these teams have been able to disrupt our rhythm with a combination of street smarts, physicality and pace. It was a bit depressing that we weren’t able to learn and find a way round these teams. Hope it’s a wake up call for recruitment and coaching next season.

There was an interesting Athletic piece this week where they'd spoken to a number of Premier League figures about what the market may hold this summer. The TL;DR version is this... Even big clubs focused on loan deals over permanent Certain foreign leagues in big trouble with teams needing to sell and slash wage bills that will throw up some bargains Clubs realise the market is depressed and players who they wants £15m for last season may be allowed to leave for £5/6m Players similarly are adjusting expectations - so those who might ask for £80k p/w may now take £40/50k. Huge focus on value now- so players with only a year left on their current deals could have a big market (Todd?) New WP rules will force some clubs to switch approach (us and Brentford name checked specifically but we already knew this). The most interesting quote was an exec claiming 'the Championship is finished' as nobody has as money, everyone needs to sell and they expect the 3 teams that go down to bounce back most years due to the financial advantage. For us it feels slightly like the stars are aligning to give us a real shot to improve the squad this season. We've ridden out covid looking pretty healthy financially and the current situation may drive players who would have been hugely out of budget two years ago into the realms of possiblity. From a selling standpoint, it does seem like everyone expects clubs to be much more cautious- so will the market that we all expect for Emi or Max actually develop? And if not will those players be looking to push moves through at a lower price, or does it mean we can keep most of our key assets? You'd imagine Webber and co will be looking to potentially exploit the issues in places like France but also it may be the year to do some shopping in the Championship to increase the homegrown contingent. All in all it could be an interesting summer.

Just mostly reposting what I’ve said on the match thread as it applies here - A few people seem to be getting a bit carried away with this ‘4 losses against the prem teams from last season’ thing, as a reminder; 0-1 Bournemouth away - no Buendia and no Cantwell and one of the first games of the season - we were still getting over the lockdown hangover - can’t read anything into that 0-1 Watford away - a tight game with limited chances which Watford edged, disappointing performance but not surprising given Watford’s home record 1-3 Bournemouth at home - absolutely schooled them for 20 mins, scored one of the goals of the season, then got a man sent off very harshly and had to play 70 mins with 10 men - can’t read anything in to that 0-1 Watford at home - 3 days after the Bournemouth game played with 10 men for the majority and followed by the promotion party. Whereas Watford still absolutely needed to win. Can’t read too much into that either So of the 4 games only the Watford away performance came without any mitigating factors. I think it’s pretty harsh to use it as a bar for measuring anything against to be honest. Bournemouth and Watford are also far from the only physical sides in the league though. What about Middlesbrough, Stoke, Cardiff, Millwall, Swansea etc? We’ve shown this season we can really dig in and win dirty, how many wins by 1 goal is it now? How many less goals conceded than 2 years ago? I don’t think we can take much away from a dramatically improved version of Farke’s Norwich City because of these 4 bad results. I would agree though that we definitely still need to beef the team up before we can expect to be consistently competitive in the prem, I just don’t think that can be pointed at conclusively these Watford / Bournemouth games. The signings we have made and the change in style has clearly helped us cope with physicality this season, another few quality additions and I think we could be there or there abouts next season (for 17th..).

The biggest lesson I can see we need to learn, and quickly, is that we shouldn't let the players get really pissed three days before a big game!

Why are some of our supporters so quick to throw our players under the bus after a couple of defeats? To label half of the squad not good enough? Why are they unwilling to give our players the benefit of the doubt considering we were already promoted and had to play the majority of Saturday with ten men after a dodgy red card which affected their energy levels last night? Why are they moaning and groaning when we are already up and five points clear with only three games left? Why do they see fit to ignore the previous 41 games and judge the players on the last two fixtures? Why do they begrudge the players celebrating on Saturday post match after a fantastic achievement in bouncing back first time of asking? Baffles me.

Floyd did not have three times the lethal dose of Fentanyl in his body. A clear lie , the medical evidence was unequivocal on that. That you can post such rubbish shows just what a dilapidated old crack head you are.

By which I assume you mean providing himself with an extremely comfortable lifestyle by virtue of scamming gullible idiots like yourself. Not forgetting, of course, his substantial EU pension even though he hardly ever turned up to do any work - the worst attendance record in the whole of Europe and although he will receive his pension from the EU it will actually be funded by British taxpayers courtesy of the Brexit deal, so he got us all on that one. And finally he topped all that up with a shed load of fraudulent expense claims - think he had to pay a bit of those back but I'm sure he still came out ahead on that one as well. So for the first, and only, time I agree with you - shame he succeeded at everyone else's expense though - mind you that's been pretty much eclipsed by the complete shambles and wasting of many, many billions since Johnson took over so I think we'd all forgotten about Farage ........... until you reminded us 😀

😁

We were below our best, Watford wanted it more than us and our players didn't have normal preparation for the game. And we only lost 1-0 in which one of our players was fouled in the build up to their goal. Yes we didn't play well or create much, but Cantwell had 2 decent chances to get something from the game and on another night we would have done. The lads have done a stupendous job and I'm sure they'll still bring home the title, our survival next season does not hinge on an "off" night against the second best team in the league who needed the win to secure promotion

I don't want any of them back. I was looking forward to a Premier League without any of the "Big 6" to be honest. Bit disappointed now.

I think it was the fact that we watched as a man was slowly murdered by someone that was supposed to "protect and serve" and the fact people were unsure if the murderer would get punished purely because of the skin colour of the victim. I don't really care how scummy they were as it is immaterial.

***Norwich announce formation of East Anglian Super-duper League*** Today, Monday 19 April, the best clubs in East Anglia announce the formation of a new East Anglia League which will act as a showcase for the finest talent from the wash to the Waveney. The six best clubs in the region - Norwich City, Cambridge United, Peterborough United, Colchester United, Kings Lynn and Lowestoft Town - will play for the newly minted ‘Broads cup’ and prize money expected to be in excess of £48.50. Sponsorship opportunities have been snapped up, with Roy’s of Wroxham and Bewilderwood among the organisations bankrolling the venture. The move was condemned by East Anglian strugglers, Ipswich Town, who said ‘These plans involve teams of players being able to kick a ball to each other for ninety minutes. Our experience tells us that this is impossible. It’s elitist nonsense, and would you mind lending me a fiver for the bus home?’

Well you would, but it seems that the football authorities have for many years considered the use of league tables "a better rule of thumb"

Another unexpected Brexit bonus😂 Its Boris what done it, apparently. Seems a bit of a stretch to me but the Europhiles have to blame someone.

Those all feel like pretty thin excuses to me across 360 minutes of football (and one goal scored by us). No one was more angry about the Pearson red than me, but he showed that sh*thouse nous that is effective at top level football. Look the main goal has been achieved but this is a wake up call at the right time to put it right for next year.

Not sure what they're complaining about when they get to watch silky football like this each game.

Sorry but I strongly disagree. Bournemouth did not get relegated playing a physical brand of football. Howe was much more progressive than that and they tried to play football on the deck, which is exactly why the BBC and others were going on about them non-stop. As noted on the day elsewhere. The Bournemouth starting 11 cost over £100mil. I say over, I got to £100mil and then couldn't find the fee for Pearson. So 10 of their starting 11 cost £100mil to assemble. That's minimum three times the cost of our entire match day squad on Saturday including fees we haven't yet paid for Giannoulis. Since Howe left and even more so after his successor, they have become more physical. Woodgate doesn't seem to be as progressive a manager and was audibly encouraging his players to be more physical and crunch our players. In reality, over recent seasons, teams that have tried to survive in the premier league using that as a primary tactic have struggled. Stoke, Blackburn, Bolton, Cardiff etc. Equally, those that have persisted with that have also struggled to bounce back up. In fact, look at he top 6 of the Championship and even the bottom half of the Premier League as you suggest. How many can you truly say play a "physical" brand of football? I'm not talking about defensive tactics a la Bruce at Newcastle - they will often try to play on the deck especially when they have Wilson and Saint-Maximin etc playing. Prem: 10 - Leeds 11 - Aston Villa 12 - Wolves 13 - Palace 14 - Southampton 15 - Newcastle 16 - Brighton 17 - Burnley 18 - Fulham 19 - West Brom 20 - Shef Utd So out of those ten teams, which teams rely on a physical approach to games? I think the only sides you can accuse of doing that are Burnley, West Brom and Shef Utd. You might make a case for Palace but I think that's a bit unfair as they certainly try to play football, again, I see them as being more defensively minded like Newcastle rather than relying on the sort of thuggish smash and grab route one physical football we see from the likes of Allardice and Dyche teams were they will try and get it forward to a target man ASAP and try to play from there. You certainly can't say Fulham, Brighton, Southampton or Wolves play that way at all, not even close and even Leeds... Bamford is hardly the epitome of a thuggish centre forward is he? Physicality is part of every game, and we have won games this season that have been far more physical. A large percentage of the physical side of the game is mental. If you want it more, you can beat anyone. I played with a chap who was tiny in a London league in my early-mid 20's. He was born premature and size and weight wise was rarely going to be an even match physically for 90% of the midfielders and defenders he would be up against. I reckon he would have been 5'6"/5'7". I have never seen someone so small physically spin defenders the way he did. He'd set his feet in a flash and roll his shoulders, several 6'+ chaps were left unbalanced and on the floor because of the speed he could set his centre of gravity and almost flick them aside. He wasn't scared of a tackle either. Equally, back in Norfolk, I played with a teacher who would have been a similar height. He did more or less exactly the same thing, but in the air... I don't think there is really a debate in it, people are just looking into this far, far, far too much. And it's not particularly healthy. Folks are just forgetting simple probability. We cannot go on forever unbeaten. We had put together a tremendous run of results, unbeaten in god knows how many. It felt to me that our celebrations were an expression of relief more than anything else. There has been no let up, many haven't had a break since the start of the season barring injuries they have had, and even then Pukki was rushed back before he was really ready due to Hugill being injured. Folks just need to stop over analysing it all and realise that even in the Championship, we are going to be beaten every so often, expecting an unbeaten run of 14-18 games is just insane, at any level. The fact that we had gone unbeaten in 13 prior to Bournemouth was always going to go against us, not for us. We'd managed games well, got goals and then passed the ball around without stepping up into higher gears. Lastly, if we should be worried about results against Bournemouth and Watford, and I don't think there is any real need to get unreasonably so and try to find more reasons for those results to mean anything, what does that say for Bournemouth and Watford who have lost to worse sides than us and more times? At one point Bournemouth had dropped out of the top six altogether. Reading too much into it. Two games in four days, celebrating promotion, red card, sigh of relief. I expect a Farke style response Vs QPR. Not worried about the Premier League as there is a summer ahead yet.

Hungover from being allowed a beer, and up against a team looking to seal promotion. Plus a little bit of us not being physically equipped for the Premier League, but one would hope we are looking to do some business this summer and perhaps bring a few in - and you would hope that they are with a view to giving us a bit more physicality? Sorenson, Hugill, and Gibson all had that in mind. Tettey, Vrancic and Xavi off the wage bill, probably £30m for Aarons, might be some scope to make a few decent signings this time around? We couldn't rectify the problems we had last time in the Prem in one transfer window, not unless we wanted to end up having to have a transition season again and that is far too high risk. Webber and Farke both spoke about being bullied physically after relegation, they know the problem, i don't think we can expect us to sign diminutive players in the summer, and it is the reason why Vrancic won't be retained.

Exactly this. I actually posted something similar on my Facebook. Listening to talk sport the other day was sickening. The same people who condemn clubs like ours for being self funded and not jumping into debt to spend hundreds of millions just to play along side their media darlings, are now condemning those same darlings for having the billionaire owners, when these so called experts haven't ever looked twice at the money before now. Having their cake and eating it springs to mind when it comes to the way they are viewing what's happened. And very frustrating. One last thing the line that really got me (can't remember who said it, whoever does drive on TS) was "if the big 6 get to go to this league and stay in the Premier league, it will just make it a league of haves and have nots" Sorry to break it to you matey its already that sort of league. What are they on about!

I bet you're fun at parties............

***Norwich announce formation of East Anglian Super-duper League*** Today, Monday 19 April, the best clubs in East Anglia announced the formation of a new East Anglia League which will act as a showcase for the finest talent from the wash to the Waveney. The six best clubs in the region - Norwich City, Cambridge United, Peterborough United, Colchester United, Kings Lynn and Lowestoft Town - will play for the newly minted ‘Broads cup’ and prize money expected to be in excess of £48.50. Sponsorship opportunities have been snapped up, with Roy’s of Wroxham and Bewilderwood among the organisations bankrolling the venture. The move was condemned by East Anglian strugglers, Ipswich Town, who said ‘These plans involve teams of players being able to kick a ball to each other for ninety minutes. Our experience tells us that this is impossible. It’s elitist nonsense, and would you mind lending me a fiver for the bus home?’

OMG YF! Are you suggesting Swindle isn't the economic genius he has told us he is? I think I might faint.

They're waiting for the super league invite as everyone is pulling out of it 😂

That's for sure. However, I will chalk this one up as a definitive "win" for the Positive Brexit outcomes.

Where's Cambridgeo when you need him?. Must have been stopped for speeding on the way home from school.

https://www.pinkun.com/sport/norwich-city/transfer-rumour-norwich-interested-in-celtic-defender-7915000 And here we go again. Would be a very good signing on paper as bigger clubs than us have been sniffing round him in the past, so the competition may be a bit too strong unless Celtic's poor season has caused his stock to drop.

Although they get the lions share of the revenues, many are also heavily in debt. Sounds like an expenditure cap is required to protect us from them and them from themselves, they are obviously working on the theory of "too big to fail"

In an earlier series, Hastings spelt it definately.

Otherwise known as "binner glory years syndrome".

Fanboy gets over excited when meeting his hero. "It was exactly like the time David Bowie visited my flat." said the 70 year old, North Norfolk resident halfwit.

Watford fan here. Your panic about not clinching the title is similar to all the bedwetting on our forum after the loss to L*t*n. I doubt very much you'll allow a 5-point swing in only 3 games. It will be tough for us to win all 3 remaining games in the first place & even if we do, the likelihood of you not winning 2 games is low, I think. The fact you've lost 2 in a row straight after guaranteeing promotion is not surprising, especially considering the way you were comprehensively 5h1t-housed by the most cynical side in the division on Saturday, and then had to face us when you were maybe not in peak physical condition! To put into context claims on here that we have almost the same squad as last season, here is a list of players from last season no longer in our squad: Doucoure, Deulofeu, Capoue, Pereyra, Holebas, Janmaat, Gomes and a (past it) Mariappa. At least 5 of that list would have been 1st choice starters, so that has left a big hole in the squad which has taken us a while to learn how to deal with. Hopefully we can both buck the trend next season and manage to avoid an immediate return to the Championship.

🤣 That is absolutely dreadful - even if it were at your local five-a-side!

Gordon, it has been a fantastic season, fantastic season. Look where we were for most of last season before the pandemic and how we have now acquired players like Skipp on loan, Gibson and Dimi. We have built a philosophy of reaching high and taking players with us, we have turned a very flat feeling after the end of the prem season to one with flow and attractive football. We have achieved our goal this season, we have others this season. It is fantastic. It means that next season we have to strive to be better with a higher level of competition. Improvement, responsibility collectively and individually will be required at a higher level next season. Constructive criticism is fine at all levels of management, as we have heard Farke is meticulous about that. I like that, I want our manager striving to get the best, whether that is with new competition fighting for a spot against a stalwart starter this season or if it a genuine starter. We have had many recent promotions through great cohesion, technically ability and momentum. Many things I am grateful for but we have never addressed the bite and aggression in tackles or physicality we have needed across the park for the prem. We need to improve our squad for next season, we need players on the bench who will make a difference at prem level. So our recruitment begins and there are areas to improve now we have the means, finances and prem league football. It is not a bad thing it should be embraced rather than thinking we need to sell a star player to stay afloat or if we realise we don't have star players for whichever league we are in. Roll on the summer and new additions to build our squad into a better group. There are positions that we all have outlined and centre half, defensive central midfield, number 10, striker etc. There is a lot we can do in-house and have with many players improving each season. But now we build again for a Premier league campaign.

Yep, very similar to the goal he scored against Wolves in the semi final of the playoffs a week or so later! The playoff final, although disappointing, was a great day out, such a shame Wembley is in the middle of nowhere it's not got a patch on the Millennium Stadium for location.

.....and I have no doubt that Webber will be making plans as we speak..!!!!!🔰

He's the guy who daughter has the UEFA president for a godfather right? He's thrown away more than just professional relationships on this project. Anecdotally, Man City and Chelsea were only told of the plans at the last minute and advised "you're either in or you're out", and given the clubs already involved they jumped in more in fear of behind left on the platform while the money train pulled out. I don't believe they really understood what they were signing up to as fully as the others, and were the most vulnerable as a result to the backlash. That doesn't excuse them, not at all, as they've still thrown the other 14 EPL clubs under the bus for their own sakes, but I wouldn't put them in the same bracket as Liverpool, Arsenal, Man Utd and Spurs. Spurs should get a bigger punishment simply for pure cheek!

I'm still in the Champions ballroom on the top deck partying away 🍾

Really?? You don't think that only having a two day gap after having played almost a whole game with 10 men because of aforesaid red card must have been a factor in us being a little sluggish this evening?? I'll take our extra skill and technical ability all day long over Watford's (and Bournemouth's) 'physicality' - you're right that their approach is the template for the lower two thirds of the Premier League - one of the many reasons why the EPL is such a dreadfully dull and predictable league. Fortunately Farke doesn't seem inclined to follow that template - makes a very refreshing change in football to have someone who will stick to their principles 😀

Ah the old "it was before my time" chestnut.............

Can we worry about next season later? There are three games left to hopefully enjoy. Can't agree about Kenny. I thought he was our only midfield player tonight. Even Emi was anonymous. Todd clearly was injured. But do agree that we were bullied out of it tonight.

thought Cleverley really showed his prem class tonight. was an irritating POS throughout but knew where to draw the line

You must have been watching a different game. I can’t remember McLean playing any sort of decent pass. Too much Irn-Bru Saturday night?

We don’t seem able to beat the ex pl teams. It shows the minimum standard we need to progress.

Kenny had a much better game than Skipp. Our supposed contender for POTS has had two quite dreadful games, and tonight he was truly outplayed. Lots of credit in the bank of course, but not sure why you pick on Maclean when the whole team apart from Krul and Hanley played like they had hangovers.

It seems we may have all been wrong about this competition. The knockout stages have been hugely entertaining

They catch him high up his leg sure, but his leg is totally on the ground at the point of contact, so Giannoulis' foot isn't high off the ground. As mentioned above it would be akin to an accidental trod on the foot if Pearson didn't slide in like that at the last second. Maybe Giannoulis could've reacted differently in that split second but I don't think he had much time - perhaps Pearson's aggression took him by surprise? A lapse in concentration? Either way I think he's really unfortunate.

I don't think he has anything close to that kind of thinking time to make such a decision, unfortunately!

I think you're right. I suspect and hope we will sign another striker in the summer more in the Teemu mode.