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[quote user="Canaries in Bed"] Isn''t there an East Anglian ambulance out the front of the Barclay? I sort of agree with you''re saying but think how some low life scum would take advantage of it, There are plenty of entrance points for the ambulance service to come in. Hope he gets better, that is 2 in last few months. [/quote] The medics took him right past us on a stretcher - his eyes were open, he seemed to be breathing OK but looked absolutely terrified. I too hope he was saved by the chap who did the CPR. I wonder if the bloke who shouted out obscenities at him from a couple of rows in front of us is proud of himself tonight? Him and the bloke relieving himself by my car in the County Hall carpark remind me that we have some right knobheads among our supporters.

[quote user="jbghost"]Interesting one this. Sale of the ground would enable Delia to take out a lot of the money she has put into the club along with the Turners and others who have loaned the club money. No ground and the value of the club is much lower making a takeover so much easier.[/quote] What Delia actually said was that the ground wouldn''t be sold because it provides lovely collateral for the banks. Obviously if we sold the ground and paid off all the debts we would only need the banks for cashflow purposes. If all the debts are paid off, this might also release some of Delia and Michael''s shares to other members of the board. So, I suspect the "ground selling" argument is part of a much bigger picture. As for our attractiveness to an investor, I don''t think owning the ground is relevant at all or the indebtedness because they effectively cancel each other out (assuming the ground would realise enough to repay the debt). The problem with selling the ground is that it MUST be to a "friendly" with guarantees that the lease is very long term and watertight. Perfect opportunity for Peter Cullum''s pension fund if you ask me.......!

[quote user="lufc83"]Hi all, would just like to commend you on your victory at Colchester today, a superb win for you, I think you are nailed on to go up this season, easily the best side that have come to ER this season. I am actually now extremely concerned with how we have played in the last 2 games against two of the weaker sides in league one. We are definitely suffering from the Beckford ''will he stay / will go saga'' the transfer request hs obviously knocked the stuffing out of us a little, which will no doubt be music to your ears. I did think we would win the league, but watching you guys score for fun I am beginning to think you could snatch 1st unless we drasticlly start to improve and Beckford either commits or pisses off. Anyway, best of luck for the rest of the season, may the best team win. Enjoy tonight![/quote] Today is one of those days that you follow football for, when it all comes together. They don''t happen very often, at least not to us, so we will enjoy it. But there''s a long way to go yet and essentially it''s still any two from four - I don''t think Colchester are out of it yet and I am sure they will come back over the next few weeks. Huddersfield and Swindon will still think they have a chance too - Swindon particularly now they have Pericard and games in hand at home (one against Leeds). We have had a great run and long may it continue, but we will probably have a blip at some stage. Charlton are still on our tails but have some really hard fixtures, particularly at the end of the season. Colchester''s squad depth may catch them out. I don''t like the arrogance of some of my fellow fans on here who seem to think we will just turn up and win and that we will finish top just because we are Norwich. To be honest, Leeds probably deserve it as much as us and I really hope we go up together. I don''t really care if its first or second for us. I am very hopeful and positive, mainly because Lambert seems so on the ball about everything - the recent signings are impressive and he handles the egos of the players really well, keeping everyone in the squad involved and committed. His test is still to come though, if and when we drop some points, like Leeds just have. If Grayson is the manager he seems to be, Leeds will come back very strongly now. Long way to go, as I say, but great fun and a really enjoyable season so far - fingers crossed that it stays that way. Good luck to Leeds - no-one seems to like them much, but they were the stand out team of the first half of the season and I''d much rather go up with them than Charlton or Colchester. And I still fancy Southampton to win the playoffs....

[quote user="chicken"][quote user="Bob Franklin"]Always struck me as a right midfielder not a right back. Liked to get forward but didn''t like the return journey and left a yawning space down our right flank that often led to goals. Glad he''s gone.[/quote] In fairness when was the last time he played with a decent right winger in front of him? I thought he had a good partnership with Crofty for a while. Personaly I think a lot of people are very harsh on him, he was the only defender with any real pace - in some ways it was good to have him in the team when playing against teams with a pacey striker or winger. Never as bad as a lot of people made out. Average Championship right back lets face it, maybe nothing special but also not useless either. A shame that he never really put any consistancy in because he could be a hell of a player. [/quote] You can''t have seen the same games as me! Semi was shocking for most of last season and at the start of this. He was always out of position and seldom stopped a cross from coming in. Funnily enough at Southampton away last year he had one of his worst games, allowing their striker to shoot from anywhere without worrying about things like closing down or tackling. Presumably Pardew hasn''t seen those highlights because he was absolutely dreadful. He''s nowhere near an average Championship right back - he''s not even an average League One right back, as Col Who showed on the opening day. I''m delighted he''s gone.  

[quote user="SimonOTBC"]Official SMS.[/quote] Excellent news. Lambert is really starting to weed out the non-players in the squad. Theo and Curo next, hopefully!

[quote user="Yelloow Since 72"]The first goal will be crucial, so I hope City can break the recent habit of starting slowly. In their last home game, they managed a 2-1 win against a good Southampton team in spite of the Saints being well on top on possession, shots, corners and the rest. Good finishing will be the key, and City have that in abundance, so I would say 2-1 to City. It will certainly be the hardest test since Leeds though.[/quote] I am usually nervous about games like these, where everyone is talking about revenge and putting little clubs in their place. Col Who are very good at home - defensively we are not brilliant but we score goals so I can see this being another high scoring game. If we start well I think we''ll win,maybe 3 or 4-2 but a 3-3 wouldn''t surprise me. I can''t see us losing......but then I think I said that about the home game! I would take a draw now.

[quote user="JF"] Her words on not selling the ground mean nothing. It will be out of her control when it becomes a case of that or going bust. Without investment it''s just empty words and i''m not having a go at her it''s just how it is. [/quote] There might be a bigger issue here in that Delia may have spoken without the Board''s authority. Clearly as the majority shareholder she can veto any deal, but if this is an "option" as Bowkett said it was I don''t think a Chairman or a CEO will be happy that a majority shareholder has publicly removed that option without discussion. If I was in either of their positions and she spoke out without Board authority, I would walk - what authority do they have if she is speaking out about decisions which haven''t been made? You are right in that without investment, the eventual sale of Carrow Road is inevitable as it is the only way the loans can ever be repaid. For Delia to say what she has said just emphasises how un-businesslike she is. I just wish she would stick to cooking when she gives interviews.

[quote user="MoCamara"]I have been well informed by a source very close to the club that if the club are well within the play offs, but not looking like getting automatic promotion, we will have to go into administration. We can''t afford not to seems to be the line coming from him as the financials of the club truly are terrible.[/quote] Then your informer is himself mis-informed. It''s really very simple: Assets of £35m. Liabilities of £23m. If they go for administration the owners effectively lose the balance sheet value of £12m. Why would they do that? The figures are not great but they are also not disastrous. The only way we would go into administration is if cashflow becomes a problem - they have already said we have bank support to the end of the season but we have a £2.9m cash shortfall for next year. That means that unless we get investment we will have to realise some of our assets - we either sell players or the land we own or the ground. However, I don''t see promotion solving this problem - the cash rewards for promotion are not very big and extra TV money in the Champs will not bridge that cashflow gap. Plus wages will go up. I know it is unpalatable but selling the ground and leasing it back is the obvious solution and I have no doubt that is what a sensible business would do - especially if we can build in a "buy back" option at a guaranteed return, so that if we do manage to get to the Prem and stay there, we can get it back again. Not owning the ground is not really a problem as long as the lease is held by a "friendly" - the problem would come if the lease is moved on to a "not so friendly". But this is the way the vast majority of businesses operate - most don''t own their premises; do have bank overdraft facilities etc. The difference is that we would then HAVE to make an annual profit, and that may well impact on the way the football team itself is managed.

[quote user="grantroederdisaster"]Wallsall on Tuesday is a complete waste of time - should of been called off on Friday![/quote] The forecast for my area has been wrong every single day since this cold spell started. Today they forecast light snow all day and temperatures of 1 max. We had a lovely sunny morning, about 4 degrees. Sky still clear. The computer models they use are similar to the long term ones they use for climate change projections and on which the western world is basing its entire environmental policy.....

[quote user="Pyro Pete"]Heard after Grant Holt had just misplaced a pass:  "That Grant Holt is rubbish. He''s no player. All he does is score goals." Actually, that wasn''t misheard. Someone near us said this at today''s game! Words fail me... [/quote] So, you don''t do irony then? Just before Martin scored, I said to my brother that he was having a poor game and I would substitute him. Then when Exeter scored I said that I would take off Holt because he wasn''t having his best game. Holt then scored. I then said that we should take off Hoolahan, hoping he would score too. Lambert took him off. Clearly I would make a brilliant manager.

[quote user="grantroederdisaster"] What and be docked 10 pts meaning we didn''t go up this season - yeah great!   See where your coming from with wiping out debts but half of our debt is like a mortage which we are able to pay of every year.   The club saying they are in 23M in debt is like someone who owes £150,000 on their mortage saying they are £150,000 in the red!     [/quote]   Well, they are, in a way. Of course it depends what the house is worth. Carrow Road is shown in the accounts as being valued at £34.5m but in reality they wouldn''t be able to sell it for that. As Bowkett says the only type of deal likely to attract an investor would be a sale and lease-back producing, say, 4% above base per annum on capital. That produces only £22m as a capital sum for our projected £1m rent per annum. An investor at that level would also want some guarantees that his income is secure. Now, without wishing to resurrect previous arguments, if we had a really wealthy supporter who wanted to help out the club but keep things on a business level this would be a great deal. Hopefully Peter Cullum is still reading this messageboard.......

[quote user="The Duke"]Why are the questions asked to the new players so stupid? i mean come on half of what they answered wasnt even a question just blank statements. RW to OJ "Paul Lambert has said he''s after young and hungry players thats how you described youself" - first off its not a question and secondly he''s hardly going to say no is he you pleb! ?? to OJ "Did you play against Norwich" - What has that got to do with anything about him signing or his ambitions??? RW to ZW " When you were at Liverpool you played with Sami Hypia in game..." That not a question its a statement what do you expect him to say back other than "yes yes i did!" Can you please hire someone who actually asks a question worth asking! [/quote] TV interviews always make footballers sound  thick - but I agree that the interviewer was dreadful

[quote user="morty"]Its all about the team. A well coached team is greater than any individual and I think Lambo is assembling a team that works for each other. Look at our Championship team, it was mostly staffed with hard working, effective footballers who played for each other. [/quote] Absolutely correct. We supposedly had Championship quality players last season and look where that got us. Marshall, Croft, Clingan, Doc, Shackell, Russell, Bell, Lita, Hoolahan, Drury etc etc. Its the team that succeeds or fails. We wouldn''t have gone down with a decent manager - all of those players were good enough. When I look at those names it brings home just how inept our management was.

[quote user="eddy melito"]its a very low risk signing. boothroyd coached him for 2 years at norwich so knows him well. also hes a freebie having left ankaraguku in the turkish superliga. he will be on little money and cover the right side where we have been a man short since vincent has been injured most of the season.[/quote] Doesn''t really alter the fact that he''s rubbish though, does it?

He won''t go to Burnley. Celtic, on the other hand.................but, for the moment, signed.

[quote user="scrimmage"]Yes we do need him in case Hoolahan gets injured and we have to revert to 4-4-2, or if we need another option in a game in which we are behind. He has pace to frighten defences and therefore is a good option to change the game. McAnuff looked quality today but we could never get him he''s upper champ quality, maybe in the summer, but not yet. [/quote] I watched McAnuff a lot when he was at Watford - he has a good game when the cameras roll up, otherwise he''s pants; that''s why he''s had so many clubs. Watford fans don''t rate him and were delighted when he left. He''s nowhere near good enough for upper Championship and I''ll be surprised if he keeps his place in a struggling Reading team. I wouldn''t want him anywhere near our club - McNamee was easily the better player for Watford.

[quote user="GJP"] [quote user="gissing canary"] Martin is a must sign up ASAP if you ask me, Doherty and Russell have been useful, but doc in championship - not sure if a great idea again.  [/quote] Both Doc and Rusty would be a higher priority than Martin, for me.   [/quote] There are some unbelievable comments on here sometimes, and this one is right up there with the best. A wind up surely?

Newcastle home 2-1 in the prem

[quote user="Norfolk Lutonian "] Best player: Robert Green Most dedicated and gave the most: Darren Huckerby [/quote] Oh, you mean the "England" keeper who still can''t save a shot across his body? Give me a break! Darren Huckerby was our best player by a country mile.

[quote user="can u sit down please"]I think he makes some good points. Most of them make me thin kwe can/will catch Leeds. Our strength in depth aint tooo bad wither. Just ask Gillingham/Swindon from the JPT games and Millwall. McDonald, Rudd, Nelson, Otsemobor, Wiggins, Gill, OTJ, Adeyemi, Spillane (untill he''s back), Hughes has been bit part and McNamee. [/quote]   Sorry, I can''t really take anyone seriously who thinks Kilkenny is a better player than Hoolahan. If that''s really your starting point spainboy it degrades everything else you say. Having said that, I can''t see Leeds not getting the 40 points or so they need to go up this year and if I''m honest I think they''ll have it wrapped up by Easter

[quote user="spainboy"]Leeds wont sell for 1.5m. Grayson clearly stated in the summer he will be kept and so far he has. He since came out 3 weeks ago saying that he could never stop speculation but again wont be sold unless a ''silly'' amount came in for him. 1.5m is laughable in todays money.League one or not. Prolific strikers with pace are like gold dust in the championship.Lazy or not, Beckford has delivered 73 goals in 108 games. Ill put money on that he wont be sold in Jan. I think we will let him walk though when we are promoted back to the championship.[/quote] For once I agree with you spainboy. Can''t see a prem team coming in for him in Jan and he won''t want to miss out on a big, fat signing on fee in the summer.

[quote user="NCFC_Edward"]David Marshall is a better keeper than Fraser Forster.[/quote] Wow, what a statement! How many games did you see last season? Marshall was poor in most of them and he clearly didn''t want to be here. Particularly in the second half of the season under Gunn and particularly in the crucial games away from home he was absolute pants. Forster is technically very sound and will be a top Premiership keeper.

[quote user="Colu_Tristan"] Please get a grip! We''ve given you lot a bigger allocation in our 10k stadium than you gave us in your 25k stadium. Our chairman is perfectly entitled to express his disappointment with your clubs conduct over the tapping up and subsequent poaching of Paul Lambert; it''s called freedom of speech, a concept you don''t seem to be able to get to grips with. It''s quite sad to see grown adults sulking over a ticket allocation. [/quote]Oh right, so when your bloke speaks out its "freedom of speech" but when we reply we are "sulking". Hmmm. Not sure that''s how it works in the big world, but maybe in Col Who land.....However I concede the point that Colchester can give us whatever allocation they damn well like - if we were playing Man Utd in a top of the table clash and only expected a home crowd of 10-12,000 I doubt we would give them another 10,000 tickets just to get the money in. On the Lambert issue none of us actually know what happened apart from Lambert - I assume that our Board believes his version of events, hence the reluctance to pay you loads of money. Did we induce him to break his contract? Probably, simply by being given permission to talk to him. That tends to be what happens when a bigger club comes calling. we lost Mike Walker, John Bond etc the same way. It happens. Did we tell him to resign? Probably not. At the end of the day no-one will be able to prove or dis-prove anything - we''ll end up having to pay you a few £000''s. But your chairman will still be a c**k - all he had to do was not give us permission to talk to him, but he thought he wouldn''t go. He was wrong and has lost his reason because his ego can''t handle having made the error of judgement. Personally, I think most football club chairmen should do everything they can to stay out of the media spotlight because without exception they are not media trained and always sound completely stupid. Your guy more than most, but ours should have maintained the dignified silence, because his quote is also stupid - any club can do what the hell they want with their tickets, as he should know. Its just another game; another 3 points. Whether we win there or not promotion will not be settled on that particular day or by that result and your guy bigging it up is just inflaming it all. Unfortunately there are enough crazy Norwich fans to cause you some serious trouble on the day and your chairman should know better - if he doesn''t he shouldn''t be chairman.

[quote user="norfolkbroadslim"] For me - The positives are that we played badly away from home and we didn''t lose, we also scored 3 goals. The negatives are, we conceded 3 goals to a poor team, we have now had two poor away displays in a short period of time.  If we play like that against Huddersfield we will lose.  If we play like that away to some of the better teams we will lose - we don''t want to get hit by 7 again - Yeovil seemed to open us up easily on many occasions. I thought we would be catching Charlton up in the League when in fact Charlton have nearly caught Leeds.  We need to be winning and drawing away from home, not drawing and losing (which may be the case if we continue to play like that, otherwise we will stand no chance of catching Charlton or Leeds, neither of who look like slipping up. We will  be safe in the play offs but it is a lottery, especially against teams like Colchester, Huddersfield and Southampton - pick your winner out of that lot. There is a gap and much less than perfection for every remaining league game and we can forget automatic promotion.  Put the reserves out against Southampton and concentrate on the league. [/quote]Completely agree. Great that we scraped a point and never gave up, but we have to win at places like Yeovil to get in the top two. Worrying that both Carlisle and Yeovil simply copied Colchesters tactics and had similar success - effectively outplayed by all of them, just be putting balls deep into the channels from the right angle. Too much talk about how we are going to get better and will be promoted. This is not the walk in the park some people seem to think it is. I hope that Leeds implode and I hope Charlton falter too - but we can''t afford to. If we only make the playoffs it will be a massive disappointment, plus we will be overwhelming favourites and we all know how we perform when that''s the case. Southampton play Leeds this week - we simply must win and hope Leeds drop some more points.

I wouldn''t want him back. For a defender he was pretty hopeless in the air and no great pace either. Plus injury prone. There''s better out there, certainly for that kind of money.