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nutty nigel

Would missing out on promotion be a failure for Norwich City?

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Missing out on promotion last season was a failure. Missing out on the play offs this season would be a failure.

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In the first 16 games the pendulum seems to have swung from expecting top six to expecting bottom six to expecting top six to expecting bottom half. 
I don''t think we''ll be promoted but haven''t ruled out the play offs. I buy into the club''s new identity despite enjoying last season more than this one so far. I hope this new identity unites the fans but I think the undoing of that could be the club not meeting expectations. 

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[quote user="JF"]Missing out on promotion last season was a failure. Missing out on the play offs this season would be a failure.[/quote]more of a disaster than a failure.

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[quote user="nutty nigel"]In the first 16 games the pendulum seems to have swung from expecting top six to expecting bottom six to expecting top six to expecting bottom half. 
I don''t think we''ll be promoted but haven''t ruled out the play offs. I buy into the club''s new identity despite enjoying last season more than this one so far. I hope this new identity unites the fans but I think the undoing of that could be the club not meeting expectations. 
[/quote]

Without McNasty the Suffolk Socialists don''t stand a chance.

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Being as promotion was the stated aim and the whole overhaul was to apparently give us the best shot at going straight back up, then yes it would be.

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Getting relegated the season before last was preventable failure. Not getting promoted last season, with the parachute money and a decent squad, was a preventable disaster.Not getting promoted this season will be a life sentance.

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ricardo wrote the following post at 07/11/2017 7:01 PM:

JF wrote:

Missing out on promotion last season was a failure. Missing out on the play offs this season would be a failure.

more of a disaster than a failure.

Yeah i’d say disaster would be more appropriate. Given the ever growing finance of the PL and clubs in the championship like wolves throwing money at promotion. Failure to go up this season, or at least see significant reasons to be optimistic for next will likely leave us languishing at this level for the foreseeable future. For what it’s worth I believe we will make the play offs, based on an opinion that Tettey,Oliviera and Pritchard will be game changers when back.

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[quote user="Making Plans"]Getting relegated the season before last was preventable failure. Not getting promoted last season, with the parachute money and a decent squad, was a preventable disaster.Not getting promoted this season will be a life sentance.

[/quote][Y]

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After spending four out of five years in the top flight, of course it would be a failure to see the parachute payments evaporate and the inevitable further downsizing that would have to take place to make ourselves sustainable.However, I don''t necessarily buy the line that if we don''t get promoted this season then we''re destined for a long run in the wilderness. Wagner''s football didn''t yield immediate results at Huddersfield, and while I accept they are different people, there are still similarities from the Dortmund school. We''ve had more hits than misses in the transfer market on a limited budget, and if we can unearth one gem of a striker in the way that Zimmermann and Trybull have exceeded expectations in their respective positions, there''s no reason why we couldn''t get promoted next year or the year after.Several more of our highest earners could be on their way in the summer - Martin, Jarvis and Naismith being the obvious ones - and if we replace them wisely and cheaply then it could work. Not saying it will, just that it could.

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Our lame attempt at trying  to avoid relegation from the Premiership was complete and utter failure and humiliating. Missing out on promotion last year was a disasater, Probably not being able to challenge for even the play-offs this season is sadly inevitable with the developing squad we have. Who knows what the future brings.

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[quote user="SwindonCanary"]I know the club wants to get to the Premiership, but I''m enjoying it a lot more in the Championship ![/quote]

It really is a shame about the money because for a supporter the Championship is much more enjoyable. We have to spend a season in the poisonous Premier League every 3 or 4 years to keep the money rolling in though. I hate it with a passion. A nonsense situation where a useless 1-0 win is treated like we''ve won the FA Cup and the quest for 38 points is everything.

My preference would be to just keep the Champs team and start the PL season with a statement that we are just going to enjoy ourselves and get relegated so we can get the money - try to win some games, but happy if we don''t.

Eventually people win start to realise that PL football is OK to watch sometimes as a neutral but useless to a supporter. A bit like watching a World Cup once England are out - a spectacle, but no passion or involvement.

In a perfect world we should be able to sell our place in the PL to someone like Leeds for £250m and stay in the Champs every year.

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The phrasing and use of the word failure is somewhat leading the witness.

Objective measures of failure must include what reasonable expectations were (the legal man on the Clapham Ominibus test), rather than fans’ expectations, which may well be (entirely understandably) unreasonable in context of resources and objective parameters.

In a football context - particularly the Premier League - the neat st corollary is wages paid, according to which relegation is par for the course. Our investment on Naismith, Klose and Pinto was ambitious (though belated in a sporting sense).

This season we are endeavouring to ‘do better with less’. Our owner wealth is less than the vast majority of clubs and any parachute payments we have must be used to amortise the impending massive drop in revenues. Objectively we are not in the top tier of clubs in this league and our overdue restructuring was unlikely to produce immediate results. Had we initiated it with high or growing funds we would likely be in a far better position. We are asking a great deal of the new structure to ask it to do better with much less. The odds are against it.

Thus any failure rests on the first season back in the Championship under Neil. Where the new structure was eschewed in favour of Moxey and the status quo model of single power ex-footballer manager.

Given that our wages, revenues and sporting resources were objectively superior to most of our competitors, that season can certainly be viewed as a failure. Both in the dugout by the manager, on the field by the players and in the boardroom by the Directors. The competitive advantages were squandered in a mix of tactical hubris, plastic psychological superiority and an unwillingness to look further into the strategic corporate future of the club (until absolutely confronted with de-facto failure).

The Clapham Omnibus test has us dwindling to lower Championship level for a while, with perhaps even a sojourn or two into lower leagues, ultimately making us more attractive to an investor and perhaps forcing owners to confront and finance repeated annual losses.

Sporting magic can offset the above, Lambert miracles do happen. Very severe cost-cutting measures that will have to be enacted at the end of this season (at the latest), will have a structural, psychological and sporting shock effect for a period. You can only sell what others want of course, not what you want - or need - to sell.

The Masterclasses for years advised a similar structure to what we have now, whilst we had the funds to properly transition and support it. It is not a short-term fire-fighting fix, which is what it is being asked to do this year (‘promotion is the aim’).

Parma

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@parma

That is spot on imo.

I''d even say you could divide the initial question into two

1- would not getting promoted be a failure for Webber/Farke?

2- would not getting promoted be a failure for the club?

1) I''d say probably not, 2) I''d say yes.

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After seeing all the home games and 3 away games would say the chances of promotion are absolutely ZERO

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I don''t like the word "failure" when it is to do with football - there is always the next game - always the next season - to make things better.  You can be bottom club at Christmas and still be in the play offs at the end of the season.   Even if you don''t get promoted, there is always something to learn from why you didn''t that will help you the following season.  And if you regrded 2009 as a failure and even if you regarded the 1-7 as a failure, it led to one of the best and fun seasons we have had - which gave us momentum and got us into the PL two seasons later. So was it failure or just a stage on a journey that just has ups or downs? It is not a failure to not get promoted - it is a step on a journey that if you only look at promotion as success, means you will look on the football as being a failure most of the time.  The failure thing is just a mindset - it''s the same idea as saying we failed against Bolton, we failed against Wolves, we failed against Derby, we fail to score enough goals, we failed to stop the other teams score, the manager failed to get it right, Jerome failed to score, Murphy failed to score, fail, fail, fail.............Now some are predicting failure before it has happened, so not only are we failing minute to minute, week in week out, we are apparently failing even months before something has happened!   Fail in the past, fail in the future, fail, fail, fail, fail, fail........People accuse me of being over positive, but it is not true, I simply don''t accept that failure is a thing that needs dwelling on - any setbacks that might happen are just something to learn from and to try and improve for the next time.  We have not failed in the last three games, we have not failed this season, we won''t have failed if we don''t get promotion.  In that event, we will move forwards with renewed hope next season - oh I forgot, we''ll fail to have enough money, we''ll fail to keep our best players, we''ll fail to improve, we''ll fail, fail, fail, fail......It''s rather simple - if you look at everything as being a potential failiure, then you are really not looking forward or enjoying stuff very much, you are just thinking aout failing - and thinking about failing is a habit.  You can change habits.......if you want to.

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The Premier League relegation was about par for the course considering our resources but never-the-less there was too much of an accepting the inevitable attitude at board level, particularly in not replacing Neil when it became obvious we would go down if he remained.

Last season was the true failure. Our resources were up there with the best of them and we under-performed abjectly both on and off the field. Disastrously persisting with Neil for so long squandered any remaining chance.

This season we have had to sell millions of pounds of players, let established players capable of holding down a place for the team at the top of the league walk away for nothing and look to bring in inexpensive replacements with potential to take their place. So the answer is no. If Farke can''t achieve promotion in these circumstances it would be churlish to call that failure IMO.

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How about some of you chill out a bit and try and enjoy supporting your team ? Following our club has always been a rollercoaster ride and always will be.

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"Failure," as has been said before, is a loaded word and implies that we might reasonably have expected success. [:-*]Dare I suggest that this could be identified statistically? Two ways spring to mind:1. What percentage of other relegated teams have returned to the PL within 2 years? I don''t have the data but I am sure it exists - my guess is that it is less than 50%? If this assumption is correct, it would suggest that it is not a failure.2. The other obvious metric, as Parma has suggested is player wages, which is correlated to achievement. We had a very high wage bill last year, suggesting that last year was a failure. However, I suspect that the general player wage correlation does not apply just to the first two places in the championship, so may not be as statistically valid as suggested. Again this could be calculated - it is a shame that the article does not do so.3. There is, in addition, a fan''s view non-statistical test. My view of this is that looking at the attacking talent (front 4) we had/ have, not to have achieved promotion is certainly disappointing. Last year in particular, it was just so obvious that we needed to tighten-up defensively but time and again failed to do so. With Pritchard and Oliveira fit, together with Madison and a strong supporting cast, if we can sort ourselves out defensively, we should still regard ourselves as promotion candidates and I personally would regard a finish outside the top six as a failure.

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[quote user="king canary"]"We''ve had more hits than misses in the transfer market on a limited budget"

Have we? I''m not so sure...[/quote]In my opinion:Gunn – very goodStiepermann – very goodZimmermann – very goodTrybull – very goodReed – goodHusband – decentHanley – on the fence (too early to tell but has plenty of experience at this level)Franke – on the fence (hasn''t done a huge amount wrong apart from Millwall away)Watkins – below averageVrancic – below averageCompared to most of our recent transfer windows that seems like a pretty good record, especially when you consider the overpaid chaff we moved out from last season. And that''s before you consider the really cheap or free ''gambles'' on players with potential (Abrahams, Mourgos, Raggett, Fonkeu, Phillips).

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I agree FTW - with our limited spending we''ve managed to assemble a vaguely competitive squad.

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Hmmm.

I don''t think we can say Franke has been anything other than a disappointment- one of the more expensive signings now doesn''t even make the bench despite being fit apparently.

Equally for me the jury is still very much out on Stiepermann and Zimmerman- both strike me as ''do a job'' type squad players but nothing more.

Generally I think it is too early to judge any of them with much certainty but if forced to I''d say we''ve had two hits, two misses and a lot of ''on the fence.''

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Not sure I agree with all that Wolf.

Although Gunn and Reed have been ''Very Good'' and ''Good'', they are only on loan so going forward they have to be replaced in the summer (unless we can manage to sort a deal for Gunn which I think everybody wants). Remove those from the list it starts to look a bit different.

Steipermann hasn''t really done much good or bad, so would put him in the average to decent category. I think we may see more of him in an attacking sense going forward. Husband started poorly but has looked a lot better, especially in that run we had.

Agree with Watkins & Vrancic, although I dont think they are necessarily being played in their best positions. Vrancic on the right causes a huge imbalance, really he should play deeper in a Shelvey like position so he has time & space to pick passes - although playing Wes their isnt a much better option

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As for the bigger promotion question, from where we have come from in terms of squad & finances, missing out on promotion is a disaster.

Based on where we are at the minute, it s probably expected that we wont challenge so on that basis its not a failure - especially if we are judging Farke/Webber on it.

My biggest issue is that its just going to get harder & harder to even compete in this league, in terms of keeping quality we have and signing/building the squad

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people talk about huddersfield and how Wagner came good

Now was that the grounding webber put in or

was that Wagner is a fantastic Manager / head coach that took time to Adjust

Wagner has got huddersfield to 10th in the league and playing good football without webber

so i ask was it Wagner all along ??? i know webber got him there which he is due credit for but is Webber the Magic wand well all thought he was ??

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Was it Wagner all along? Possibly, but it''s too early to say whether Farke is as good or better. Remember, we were told that Dortmund rated him higher than Wagner and we have allegedly unearthed a gem in getting him.

In amongst our good run and at the end of it, we''ve had some awful bad luck with injuries and poor decisions, and I accept that every club gets this.

If we can stabilise between now and January and be in and around the top 6, I see no reason why we can''t challenge for a playoff place. Having Oliveira, Pritchard and Tettey in the squad and playing consistently is vital.

Whether we''re good enough to go up is another story...

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Surely it depends on setting realistically achievable targets.

Yes overall that''s got to be not only reaching, but staying in the premier league.

Personally I don''t think this team is good enough for either, and if we did get promoted this season it was be short lived, and following the inevitable relegation the team will be dismantled, as players would want to stay in PL and we would be where we are now (albeit with a few more millions to rebuild)

However if we continue to build the full squad slowly, I believe the longer stay in the PL would be achievable in the longer term, but will be hard without the parachute payments.

The board will always declare promotion as their goal, and they have to show ambition, in their statements if no where else, so yes not attaining your declared target is a failure, but looking at the bigger picture, I personally don''t think it is, as long as we continue to grow.

We are a club in transition ATM.

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