Tim Allman

Haven''t read this board for a while, and the first post I come to has cutnpaste my comments off WotB!! I''d just like to add to the first point that I made is that Hughes is becoming this season''s Gary Holt. Hughes, like Holt was in his last season, was nowhere near good enough, and his exclusion from the team and recent improved results are no coincidence. Lets hope that Worthington finally susses that Hughes is not up to it, and he doesn''t work it out (like Holt) when it''s too late, like last season. For all those "Worthy In" folk - remember that Hughes absence from the team was enforced, and our captain would have been playing on Saturday if fit. Has an injury ever saved a manager''s job?? The jury is still very much out on our manager. The jury has returned a "rubbish" verdict on our Captain though.  

A mate of mine thinks that Greeno is the spitting image of Harry Potter. Not so sure myself though.

Here it is if you would like to read it http://www.capitalcanaries.com/index.php  

[quote]hughes on right - cross against palace for deanos goal. enough said.[/quote] Hughes'' cross in the Palace game was a fluke. He couldn''t do that again if he had 100 attempts.    

Very disappointed to see Holt in there - what short memories some posters have. Anyone remember the 2001/2 season? It was not his fault he was selected last year. If the boss asked you to do a job, I''m sure you would all try your best, which is what he did. Whose fault was it that a player who was not up to playing in the Premiership was selected ?! As regards the "Worst Ever XI" - I''m amazed that no-one has mentioned the legend that is Ulf Ottoson, my own nomination for the team. Here''s a story about him from the summer when he played at Southend ten years ago. Some painful memories! http://new.pinkun.com/search/story.aspx?brand=PINKUNOnline&category=CapitalCanaries&itemid=NOED26%20Jul%202005%2007:53:42:463&tBrand=PINKUNOnline&tCategory=search    

No  - I''m not a BBC reporter FTFW, just a football supporter who lives in London, and whose parents and grandparents all lived Norwich. If I could get a job as a footballer reporter for the BBC I''d be more than happy to move jobs from my current employer! Any offers?  

By Jen Smith - our new correspondent Remember the last time we put a decent performance away from home. Yes - it was a long time ago ! Click the link to remember what it was like. http://www.capitalcanaries.com/index.php  

Good point about being lucky in our championship season. You missed a couple of stats to back it up though!   1/ The back 5, Greeno, Flem, Malky, Eddy & Drury missed only 7 games between them all season   2/ We got very lucky wins in around a number of games where crucial decisions, woodwork, late goals, deflections got us a victory. From memory, home matches : -Palace, Derby, Reading, Wigan, Sunderland, Nottm Forest, Sheff Utd, all games we won where we had a big slice of luck. Away there was of course Reading away. That’s eight games already.   In my opinion we have been suffering with NW’s poor tactics & subs for years, well before our Championship season. For example – who remembers the Watford away when we played Sunday lunchtime?. Mark Rivers, who was playing out on the left wing was either injured or exhausted and was being given the run-around by Jermaine Pennant who was on-loan from Arsenal. It took 15 minutes for Rivers to be subbed for Llewellyn who had been warming on the side-line for ages. It was obvious to all of us that a change needed to be made. Then in the last minute, when we were under siege, being saved only by Iwan, who was back defending and winning every header, our No.9 gets subbed off for Zema Abbey and Watford score the winning goal from a corner straight after, exactly the sort of cross than Iwan was heading away.   Just one example of NW''s tactics in action – I’m sure you can all think of loads more.  

[quote]what...and give the money to Nigel to spend? No thanks. Ashton i still an asset (just). let''s get rid of the liability first.[/quote] Spot on FTWF!! Worthington''s transfer dealings have been awful. A few hits and many more misses. Who trusts him to spend the our transfer cash wisely in January, if he is still around then??  All those with their hands up please meet in a phone box.      

Interesting to read the various comments on our midfield and everyone''s opinions. For what it''s worth here''s my view. 1. There is not nearly enough creativity at the moment, which unfortunately has been lost to "hard work".  Hucks has been nowhere near as effective as last season and lost lost a couple of yards of pace - it really shows 2. How many penetrating passes do we get a game from the midfield. I don''t know what the stats are but I''d bet it was very few. 3. We have three similar style midfielders in Jarrett, Hughes & Safri. Admittedly they of differing levels of quality but they all seem to want to stay in the same part of the pitch. I''m not sure if it was luck, coincidence or any other factor, but Jarrett had by far his best game (or half) in a City shirt in the second half vs Cardiff when both Hughes and Safri were off the pitch. 4 Hughes wide on the right? I''m not at all convinced and I don''t think that he''s is good enough to either beat a player or be a good crosser of a ball. I still believe that cross to Ashton in the Palace game was a fluke!  I also don''t think he''s got a enough discipline to play that role. The ball is a like a magnet to Hughes, and he''ll chase after it. We''re really struggling for width on the right, especially as Colin seems to drift inside, and playing Hughes there will make the problem worse. 5. We have not acquired a goal scoring midfielder to replace Francis. How many times has the ball been cleared the by oppo to the edge of the box and we look up and see the midfield 30 yards away. One of them needs to get up and support more. The problem is that it not their natural game to do that. 6. Do we have anyone, Marney aside, who can actually cross a ball? All in all - very poor, and we all wonder why we''ve scored so few goals this year !

This is not a rumour, before I get accused of spreading yet another one, although it might upset Greeno.   Did anyone see the reports that Calamity James will, more than likely, be back in the England squad for the Argentina match, now that Kirkland is injured yet again?   The next squad is due to be announced very soon and it is looking more and more likely that this may well be Greeno’s last selection for a while.   As this is a prestigious fixture I’m sure that Robinson will start the game, but as it’s a friendly Sven should be able to avoid controversy by selecting all the squad as subs, thus not making a choice between the two reserve keepers, although the shirt numbers may give a clue.   When Kirkland is fit again, he’ll be back in, and I’d bet a great deal of money that James will get the nod over Greeno for the third spot in the squad, now that James has served his punishment for admitting he was not ready to play against Denmark.   I really hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think I will be.

Spot on with your report Zipper. Liked the bit about the substitutions, no dodgy ones as all were enforced. Cheers, Tim

Is now on the Capital Canaries Site http://www.capitalcanaries.com/index.php Click the link to read....  

Playing out of position for Norwich is all part of the initiation process. Sven Goran Worthington, Norwich''s Manager wants all the new players to play out of position - especially if they are players from the youth team or reserves. It shows whether they are prepared to work hard and show commitment without actually showing any skill. All the younger players, ie Hendo & Jarvis, get told play in a position that they don''t want to play, but as they are so desperate to play in the first team they''ll agree to anything. The older pros, ie Charlton or Brennan get actually get to play in the their preferred "out of position" place in the team. This is still not much use to the team, but at least the older, more influential players in the team are happy. The same sort of thing happens when a new player wins a first cap for their country. Nigel Eriksson, the under pressure England manger gets Sean Wright-Phillips and Andy Johnson to agree to anything to get in the side. Wayne Bridge even got a go a left-mid. Joe Cole is now a specialist "out of position player". Wayne Rooney, as the new-boy (but still the best player, by far) in the team, still found himself at left wing in the 4-5-1 fiasco. Beckham however, as senior pro gets to play in his preferred "out of position" place in the team at centre midfield. Or am I making too many comparison between that dullard Eriksson and our diamond geezer Nigel ?

Thanks for your comments IC. A difficult one how to apportion blame on the 3rd goal. We did not close the ball down quickly enough, and the shot was through a crowd as well, but a keeper of Greeno''s pedigree would hope to stop most of those. I''ve not seen the goals on TV so my memory of it may be a little hazy; perhaps you have. I was sitting in the front row of the upper tier, just to the right of the goal, and my first thought was that he should have stopped it. Regardless of our differing opinion on it - it was a bad goal to give away, as were the first two. I don''t remember the argument between the players as I was trying to console my daughter who was close to tears just after the third goal went in!  

Thanks Gazza. I''m not going to Brum. I hadn''t planned to anyway as it''s half term and I''ve got loads of outings for the kids, which would mean an afternoon missed out with them.

Sorry if replying to your own post is sad - but I''m just getting the thread back onto the first page of the Forum. http://www.capitalcanaries.com/index.php

Sorry if it brings back painful memories for those of us unfortunate to be there. http://www.capitalcanaries.com/index.php Click on the QPR report to read it all.  

Thanks Gazza - hopefully I''ll have something more positive to write about after the QPR match, but I''m not so hopeful.  

Is on the Capital Canaries Site http://www.capitalcanaries.com/ follow the link to the Luton Report.      

That''s exactly what I said in my article today!! We probably have £2m to spend, which was the cash for the bid for Morrison. Whether Davenport wants to sign on a permament basis is another thing entirely though.  

An excellent read. http://www.capitalcanaries.com/

This is a report I wrote for the home match against Coventry in the season we won the champiship - not for the game a couple of months ago. If you don''t want to read it all - just look at the last paragraph. The game featured the usual bizarre changes and poor reading of a game. It''s obvious NW has not learned a thing in the last couple of years. I''m sure we can all recall some games where we have wondered "why the **** did he do that". Well this is one of them.  Comments appreciated - anyway here is the report, I''ve added the brackets !     The wind, driving rain and slippery pitch contributed to the worst home performance of the season. Norwich played well in patches in the first half, but the flowing passing of the games against Walsall and Millwall had deserted them. Huckerby was very subdued – a couple of jinking runs, but looked, in all honesty, like a player whose loan period was about to come to an end. (whoops!) Crouch tried hard, and was well shackled by Davenport (!!) early on but managed to head the ball across for Henderson to score from close range after half an hour. Coventry’s tactics in the first half seemed to be to lob long balls to one of their tall forwards who positioned himself next to our smallest defender Edworthy. It did not work as Green only had one save to make.   The second half started in controversial fashion as the ref gave Coventry a penalty after one their players smacked the ball against Flemings hand from a yard away. No one appealed, but the man in black pointed to the spot and McAllister sent Green the wrong way.   More bookings followed including a second yellow for Mackay after 75 minutes, the unfortunate victim of the card happy ref, whose decisions left both sets of fans bemused.   Norwich could and should have lost the game in the last ten minutes, but Coventry squandered a number of excell