westcoastcanary

[quote user="TCCANARY"]To get to the next level up and when we''ve done that to get to the next one after that and then the next one after that ad infinitum.[/quote]What "levels" are you talking about TC? Levels of footballing achievement, as in e.g. promotion to the PL, then avoiding relegation, then consolidating in the third quartile of PL clubs, then getting into the top half, then consolidating in the second quartile, then getting into the Europa League etc. (not forgetting getting further and further year by year in the Cup competitions)?The levels that actually determine what level of footballing achievement you can realistically reach and maintain are financial. So the first question to ask is how high can Norwich City realistically aim in the Wealth League of English football clubs? And as a corollary of that, how much risk are we prepared to accept in pursuing such ambition.

Has someone offered a prize for straw grasping? There are some pretty thin ones being grabbed hold of on here today. [:)]

I don''t think Bournemouth could be said to have "bottled it" yesterday PC. I saw the game and they showed great determination to get back level after going a goal down. They tore into Wednesday even after being reduced to 10 men, and carried on until deservedly taking the lead. Wednesday showed far more determination than they did at Carrow Road and genuinely deserved something from the game.As regards us, I wouldn''t use the word "bottled". I simply think we''ve shown we don''t have quite enough quality and determination to grasp opportunities when they present themselves. I may be proved wrong, we''ll see.

Lot of grasping at straws going on here, all missing a critical point. Of  the six teams in contention for promotion, which has shown the greatest capacity to fall short when the chips are down? I''m afraid the answer is us. Forget automatic, we will drop more points. Have we got it in us to win the play offs? The evidence suggests not. Next season AN can start rebuilding and in a couple of years time we may be good enough to go up and have a chance of staying up.

[quote user="......and Smith must score."][quote user="TomMoore"]''after several weeks absence'' or the international break as others would have it...... It might help us all if you replied to what I post..... [/quote] 9th March to 6th April ?.....that''s one hell of an international break! I''m replying to your posts by saying that you''re a '' fair weather '' predictor that''s all. You may well be right at the end of the season but if you only appear when it''s all good don''t be surprised if people doubt your credibility. After all we''ve got more than enough Ipswich fans doing that on here.[/quote]With respect, Tom''s credibility rests entirely on the reasons he gave for a top two finish being the "most probable" outcome. When and how often he posts is neither here nor there, nor is where we actually finish. He has been consistent in his position, and steadfast in his conviction, but neither alters the fact that his reasons have never warranted his conclusion. And they still don''t, even now.

[quote user="morty"]Love it or hate it, club cabbage is usually the cheapest way to go.Though it is one long coach journey this one![/quote]Certainly is. I can remember making the equivalent trip by supporters'' coach to Blackburn in 1968 (?). We lost 3:1! Getting 3000 game after game shows that, for the away support, it''s not the result that matters, it''s the taking part.

[quote user="TomMoore"] ................. Any credibility can be judged by the final placings...................[/quote]Actually, no. The fact that I back the race winner doesn''t mean my horse was most likely to win.

[quote user="Mr Jenkins"]I love a change from "probable " to "infinitely more possible" Yorkshire.😄[/quote][:D] [;)] Indeed Jenks, delightful sleight of thought there. Mind you, the concept of probability was trampled over in the OP, so to be fair to Yorkshire, he''s only maintaining the spirit of the thread!

[quote user="king canary"]I''d agree the Brentford seem to be a fit but the direction they seem to be going in may not fit Lambert- they seem to be wanting a situation where the manager just coaches and recruitment of players is not in their remit.[/quote]The uproar in January about Warburton leaving started when the Brentford chairman was spotted in Spain having a meal with an unnamed Spanish manager. Add that to what the club said at the time about how they wanted to develop:"You would think that a European head coach is more likely to fit in than a British manager who generally speaking doesn''t work within that system"and the prospect of Lambert taking over seems remote.

[quote user="Branston Pickle"]IMO It was daft of BJ but was also was unnecessary for the ref to card him, he''d not commuted a foul all game and a word would have done. It seems you can sometimes practically break a guys leg and not get a card, yet it is sufficient to get one for returning to the pitch from the ''wrong'' place. Give me a break. Still, what''s done is done, we have plenty of cover and get a fresh BJ back for the boro game.[/quote]What got him booked was his refusing to go off again when the ref told him. If Jonno had done as he was told at that point he wouldn''t have been booked. Which makes me wonder whether it was actually intentional (as Tettey''s 10th yellow clearly was a few weeks ago). The players know the rules well enough, and Jonno wasn''t in headless chicken mode.

[quote user="PurpleCanary"][quote user="westcoastcanary"]OK, with Watford''s win, automatic is now back in our own hands. Are we good enough? We''ll see.[/quote]Oh, we are good enough, westcoast. But, to paraphrase Mae West, "Goodness has nothing to do with it."[/quote][:P]   How about "Do we have it in us to do it?" then?

OK, with Watford''s win, automatic is now back in our own hands. Are we good enough? We''ll see.

Agree it''s only one of many factors Jenks, and a question of degree. But as I just pointed out to LDC, the mentality involved is that of the players (and the crowd incidentally), not the manager. AN is reported to have told the team they need to win every game now. Do the players have the mental strength to make that happen, or are there heads there harbouring thoughts like "Wednesday have a good record against us" and "When did we last beat Fulham?" As far as I''m concerned that''s one of the fascinating unknowns to be revealed over the next few weeks. But one thing''s for sure, it''s the players who have to do the business, not the manager.

[quote user="lake district canary"]Alex Neil does not do "bogey teams".  He has shown even in the short time he''s been at CR that he has a sort of no ninsense approach that cuts through sentiment and just focuses on what is needed to be done.   Sheff Wed or Fulham........it matters not a jot what the record is.[/quote]A textbook non sequitur there LDC. No doubt you are right that AN has little truck with these sorts of  "records". Probably every City manager has similarly rubbished our "record" against Fulham when the fixture arrives. Has that made any difference? Before the Wigan game I posted on here raising the question of whether AN had eliminated our mental frailty when playing lowly teams who we are expected to easily beat. Well, he hadn''t and we didn''t.

We''re not talking about random sequences Jenks. As Morty says, there are underlying reasons. And nobody''s talking about mystical powers. The term "bogey team" is simply a way of  referring to the statistical record. What you and I are disagreeing about is my saying that the existence of the record can itself become a factor. My opinion is that it can, just as a player being ex-Ipswich can be a factor when he comes to play against us, or just as having a good scoring record against us can be a factor next time we meet (don''t tell me Luis Suarez didn''t lick his lips when the fixture came up).

[quote user="morty"]Records like this mean nothing unless there is some kind of logic behind them, like one side is much bigger than the other and rightly wins every time.Sheff Wed are hardly a Man Utd or Man City.[/quote]Exactly Morty, these "records" are not random, there are real factors underlying them. So they can''t be dismissed as irrelevant without analysing those factors and seeing whether they can reasonably be discounted in this next instance. Furthermore, the mere existence of the "record" can become a factor in itself. Jenks doesn''t buy this, but if he talked to Fulham players I think he woulod take a different view.

......... and a factor in how the other team plays. Do you think the Fulham players don''t rub their hands when playing us? They come out full of confidence and play above themselves. The chances of us playing below our best and the opponents having a blinder are actually increased by these "records".

[quote user="foxruels"]Why on earth should our record against Wednesday (or anybody) in the last five games count for anything? Was this XI playing their current XI? Nope. Therefore pretty irrelevant. We should beat them but if we don''t play as well as we can and they have a blinder then we won''t. Simple.[/quote]So we don''t need to worry about Fulham either? Wow, that''s a relief. Trouble is, the stats show that these "irrelevancies" are actually not so irrelevant after all. It''s all concealed in your "if we don''t play as well as we can". This kind of record, "we never get what we want against Fulham", "Wednesday are a bogey team for us" can be a factor in how well the team play.

Tom Moore''s alter ego? Haven''t heard from Tom since he predicted two teams would pull away at the top .............

[quote user="lincoln canary"]...... Funny how our decent performances appear to be intrinsically linked to when a certain player is also playing decent. Shows how average we can be without wessi on top form.[/quote]Ah, the blindness of love! It''s not true that we only perform well with Wes in the team. It''s rather that, when Wes IS in the team, we only perform well if HE performs well. That''s why it would be a huge mistake to build a team round him (or round any other single player for that matter).

Far from doing "as much damage to the club as Rodent", CH did almost as much for the club as Lambert (there''s even a case for saying "more than"). It was his success in keeping us in the PL for a third season that freed us from debt-slavery to creditors and put the club in probably the soundest financial position it has ever enjoyed.

Hope the confidence isn''t misplaced. All well and good if  "what is coming" actually turns up, but that''s not always the case as we saw against Brentford, Wigan and Huddersfield for example.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-3011776/Are-Manchester-United-Liverpool-Arsenal-Chelsea-biggest-club-Sportsmail-s-study-finally-settles-football-s-great-debate.html

[quote user="Newton"]OH NO   Just wasted 4 mins of my life reading this absolute dribble - stop it or you will wake Purple up for epilogue 3rd edition This is a football board not a potential cure for insomnia     Gone ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ[/quote]BINGO!

[quote user="PurpleCanary"] Everything, on-field and off, was set up to enable Hughton to equal [his] previous level of achievement. Instead we double-digit plummeted. With the three clubs that did the same the main reason was managerial failure. Whoever was in the job performed significantly less well either than their predecessor or than they had done previously. So with us............... Hughton Season One managed very competently, Hughton Season Two managed crucially less competently, with avoidable mistakes. [/quote] Purple''s critique of Hughton''s management in the second season focusses on the 11 point difference between our 11th place finish in 2012-13 and 18th place finish a year later. There''s no disputing the points difference, but what does it show? If you look at where we actually "lost" those 11 points, the bulk of them, 9 to be precise, are accounted for by poorer results against four top teams – Man City, Man Utd, Arsenal and Everton (who had a brilliant first season under Martinez and finished fifth). Here are our results against the top seven in the two seasons:   Team                       2012-13                     2013-14               Diff Man City                      3                                  1                     -2 Liverpool                     0                                  0                       - Chelsea                       0                                  1                     +1 Arsenal                        3                                  0                     -3 Everton                        4                                  1                     -3 Tottenham                   2                                  3                     +1 Man Utd                      3                                  0                     -3 Total pts:                     15                                 6                     -9   What this shows is that, against all but 4 of the best teams in the league, our performance in Hughton''s second season was really not significantly different from his first. There was certainly no improvement, but nor was there a marked deterioration. Looked at negatively you could say we stood still; looked at positively you could say we held our own. The truth is that in neither season did we accrue enough points against teams outside the top seven to insure us against the worst when playing those seven. We were saved in Hughton''s first season by beating the odds against Arsenal and the two Manchester clubs in particular. In his second season those three clubs made sure we didn''t do it again, though against Man Utd at Carrow Road it was a close run thing. The figures for 2013-14 take no account of the fact that 4 of the games were right at the end of the season when Neil Adams was in charge. We''ll never know what would have happened if Hughton had not been sacked but for the point I''m making it doesn''t matter. But that record in his first season might have been a factor in Hughton''s belief that he could have kept us up.