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philbuzz

Wigan,Westham and a lack of Ambition by NCFC

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Is anyone else annoyed about the lack of ambition we had when we were promoted to the prem? The board and Worthy told us not to expect alot and we may be lucky and avoid relegation and losing week in and week out was a foregone conclusion. Perhaps this is where our losing attitude has come from? Wigan haven''t spent a fortune and are second in the league West ham are right up there to. Things haven''t gone wrong this season for norwich, I believe the problem started when we were promoted,when the board and Mr Worthington quoted things like...."we''re just a small club along for the ride, little old norwich etc,etc". This lack of ambition and negativity has clearly spread to the players and frankly the situation that we are in a result of the board and Mr Worthington. I think sacking Worthington is not the answer (cost implications) perhaps we should just fill in a job application for him perhaps for Wirral County or even the Ireland job, that way he will leave and we don''t have to pay him off! Rant over any way

Phil

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Yes. I think this is a bit to do with the "little Norwich" thing that was on here a couple of days ago. We spent too much time thinking "wow isnt this special" when we should have been goin at teams with everything we had. We could have stayed up imo

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I think the main difference between Worthington and Paul Jewell is that Mr Jewell inspires his players and manages with passion.

He has instilled a belief in the players that they can go out and win every week no matter who they face.

If I look back to Nigel Worthington''s comments last year he did not seem to have this belief, it was just a case of if Norwich manage to scrape into 4th from bottom then that will do.

Our players have a passionate manager and a belief in themselves which is really carrying them into a position where on paper they shouldn''t be.

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Wigan haven''t spent a fortune

Francis £1.5-2M

Connolly £2M-3M

Camara £3M

Taylor £1.25M

Henchoz - probably on a fair wedge

For a club that pulled in 8-12000 crowds that''s a lot of money to be spending

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I think you''ve slightly answered your question yourself there Phil. Yes, we are unlikely to get rid of Worthy because of the financial implications.

The reason why we didn''t appear to show much ambition was simply because we are not a wealthy club.  Our chairman does not own a large Sports chain. I believe the club thought that the signings made last season would be enough to keep us up. The 3 main signings pre-ashton all failed to deliver - Bentley, Helveg and Jonson

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I agree that there may have been problems with our attitude in the Premiership but I am not sure Wigan are much different in that regard. Paul Jewell keeps reminding anyone that will listen that staying in the Premiership is their target. Differences between us and Wigan might be:

  • A manager who has been through it (unsuccessfully!) before
  • An owner with considerably more money
  • A very poor fan base (which IMO means that we are better-placed for long-term success than they are!)

Personally, I think Wigan are the Everton of last year. I hope they qualify for Europe and then get relegated next year. Alternatively, they might have around 30 points at Christmas and then get none after Christmas and then go down this year.

I don''t buy that they are a better team than West Ham or Sunderland or us even. I didn''t buy it with Everton last year despite what they achieved.

I think the point made by Northern on another thread about early results building confidence and allowing weaker clubs to over-achieve (my words not his!) is closer to the mark

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[quote]Wigan haven''t spent a fortune Francis £1.5-2M Connolly £2M-3M Camara £3M Taylor £1.25M Henchoz - probably on a fair wedge For a club that pulled in 8-12000 crowds that''s a lot of money to be s...[/quote]

But as someone has just pointed out on another thread they also sold Ellington for £3m so their overall spend was not that big and probably not much different to our own the year before.

The big difference is that Jewell made better choices and his signing are performing whereas Worthington''s as we all know, by and large, didnt.

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If you look at Wigan, their multi-millionaire boss has not ploughed a fortune into the club - Dave Whelan is notoriously frugal as recent publicity about certain aspects of his business have shown,  he''s also prepared to fight for what he believes is right, refusing to pay Greater Manchester Police for matchday policing when he was being charged more than Man Utd...!

Obviously their fan base is less than ours - given the competition in the NorthWest from both Premiership clubs and Rugby League, they''ve had to get used to the sorts of figures that we were getting in the Hamilton days.   Of course they''ve got a good manager - Jewell has been there and done it before at an (relatively) early time in his career and in his case it seems to have been the making of him.   Again, his chairman has recently said that he accepts he may lose Jewell to a bigger club - not afraid to talk the truth there then.

Yes Worthington brought in some big names for low costs, but did he play them?   Did he play them in the correct positions when they did play?  Did they get a chance to show what they could do?  

I don''t pretend to have the answers - if I did I wouldn''t be sitting here now would I, but I do know that our beloved club is in trouble, deep trouble and that we need to get out of a very large hole, and quickly too.   Like others who post here, I work in business, and one of the things they say about change is that for it to be successful it has to be massive change - it''s no good just tinkering around and making odd little adjustments that only serve to annoy everyone.

Perhaps the time is now fast approaching to make that massive change?

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Why does eveyone once Wigan are mentioned have to start going on about fan base and money.

As pointed out there is massive competition in the North West for fans and Wigan have only been a league club for a short space of time. Where as Norwich have a captive audience with no other big clubs in the area.

This was a thread about managers and I was merely stating the case for PJ compared to NW. If you look at the two I can see PJ getting passionate during a game and being honest about his team afterwards. Whereas NW seems very bland in comparison, so when the going gets tough is he able to motivate.

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I said all along that we should have gambled in a bid to stay in the prem, if another 3 million was made avaliable in the summer we would have stayed up without a shadow of doubt. The club worried to much about failure and set their stall out accordingly rather than looking at the whole thing in a positive frame of mind. We made far harder work of winning games than we should have done last year firstly through poor team selection by the manager and we defended like schoolboys making far to many errors. We have again failed to invest sufficiently in the team this year and as a result we are looking more likely to be fighting relegation than returning to the prem. We are crying out for a creative midfielder and will continue to struggle until the situation improves.

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No Mad, Wigan are a significantly better club than us. They have belief and play good attacking football, something we haven''t seen for a while here. I don''t understand why you hope they come down, I hope we can one day get back there to play them. But with the situation at the moment god knows. Wigan may have money but they still cannot attrack big names to the club ie. Parker and Owen. Jewell made some good signings. Just wish he was our manager

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[quote]No Mad, Wigan are a significantly better club than us. They have belief and play good attacking football, something we haven''t seen for a while here. I don''t understand why you hope they come down, I ...[/quote]

Wigan have spent a little cash but have done so wisely.  They have beefed up the spine of the team (Henchoz, Damo, Kamara) with proven performers (experienced in English leagues too)  who have actually been exceptional value for money.  Linked with talented youngsters (Taylor, sniff, of Tranmere, Chimbomba (sp?)) they have invested wisely. 

More crucially the manager has had an idea BEFORE buying on the tactics he wants to use and built a team around it.  He has successfully communicated the tactics to his side who have been able to fulfill the game plan.   It is this managerial vision that differs so much from the blind spending of say a newcastle or even liverpool in recent years.

Wigan deserve far more credit than they are getting - they have no more bought their success than ANY premier club in recent years, us included. 

The fact they have small crowds is also irrelevant - they are at least double what Wimbledon started with and they were praised, rightly, as being a beacon demonstrating that the small underdog can still succeed in a sport where the elite historical clubs would rather clubs like wigan, yeovil etc would cease to exist at all. 

Long may clubs like wigan continue to tweak the pompous noses of Chelsea, Manure, Villa, spurs of this world and give clubs like ours, Bolton & Charlton a continued hope that we can one day acheive a similar level of success, even if it is just for a season or two.

 

OTBC    

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Philbuzz - Wigan are definitely not a better club than us. They may have a better team than us right now, they are certainly achieving more but time will tell.

I think you miss the point on money if you only look at transfer fees - salaries are also important. I don''t think there is much doubt that Wigan would not be where they are without the financial backing of their chairman. To say that Premiership clubs have not bought success is just daft. Chelsea are where they are because of money. Birmingham stayed up when promoted because they had money to invest.

The small crowds are important in the long-term. I think the Wimbledon example proves my point. They over-achieved for a considerable time but finally had to move to try to be sustainable. Perhaps if Wigan don''t like being in the north west they should think of moving.

The lack of fans is IMO a big reason why players don''t want to go there.

Personally, I think the Charlton model is more applicable to us than either Bolton (short-term contracts) or Wigan (big money, no fan base)!

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It''s not only the lack of ambition but the negative tactics employed by Worthington and the complete belief by the board that Worthington is a good manager.

Three seasons ago in a televised match Brian Little commented on a Norwich game that he had never seen a team bring all eleven players back to defend a corner guess which team.

Yesterday Andy Gray commented (WBA V Newcastle) that if all eleven players are back defending a corner it is very difficult to clear the ball effectively.

Four seasons after he took over nearly every corner is defended by all eleven players meaning that if we clear the ball it still comes straight back.

We still defend far to deep allowing teams to run at us without closing down in midfield have done ever since Worthington took over. When we get possession its the big hoof up to the front man instead of retaining possession by passing and moving.

Good manager I''m still to be convinced and as for the coaching staff!  

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[quote]Philbuzz - Wigan are definitely not a better club than us. They may have a better team than us right now, they are certainly achieving more but time will tell. I think you miss the point on money if...[/quote]

Wigan may have lots of money but the chairman does not believe in throwing it about willy nilly. Hence the reason Norwich ended up with Jason Jarrett. He was going to be paid a basic salary and then on top of that extra money for each appearance. Given the number of game he has played for Norwich then I think you can see now why he jumped ship when you offered him more money....

Ellington was a similar situation, the Chairman would not give big wages to a player not proven in the premiership.

As for our fan base. Norwich are competing with who exactly for their fans?

Wigan have to compete with Liverpool, Everton, Man Utd, Man City, Blackburn, Bolton. All long established teams who have been in the top leagues for a lot longer than us and all within about a 25 mile radius.

You can''t compare Norwich and Wigan because they are completely different types of club. I think the big difference though is that we have a chairman who is ambitious and wants to push the club forward. I would question if Norwich have that at the moment.

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Wonder Wiganer - I did not really want to get into an argument about fan base with you but your point about geographical isolation is over-stated otherwise Plymouth, Carlisle and all the teams in Wales would be massive! If you don''t like your location, you could follow Wimbledon''s example and move - Truro perhaps - or even St Helen''s ?

Your Chairman''s financial resources are highly significant. Not only has he spent more than I think perhaps you acknowledge, he provides safety if your ambition goes wrong and you are relgated. He does not sound all that different from our board in his approach to money - except he has considerably more personal money, I understand.

I agree that we should probably not compare our two clubs but if you look back at your posts I think that is exactly what you have done.

Essentially, I think you have a Chairman with more money and a more experienced manager (who perhaps made his mistakes at another club - perhaps we should consult Bradford fans on this?). Of course, if you were offering to swap your Chairman and manager for ours, I would of course take them - that is assuming that Abramovic and Mourinho are not available. However, you offering us advice on how to solve the serious problems we face right now is about as helpful or realistic as Chelsea fans saying that we should copy them because their Chairman shows more ambition than ours and their manager knows how to motivate players better than ours.  

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Not having a go, but we do have a lot of clubs to compete against for a fan base and are a relatively new club in the football league.

I am more than happy with the number of fans as year on year the numbers grow.

I haven''t really compared the clubs at all in previous posts, merely management styles and ambition.

I wish Norwich well in their struggle and now that we may be in a similar position in the future. Having been to Carrow Road on a number of occasions, it is a great ground with very vocal fans. It''s others on here who keep comparing Norwich in the prem to Wigan/West Ham now.

Living in Norfolk and being a Wigan fan is great at the moment, especially with a partner who is a Norwich season ticket holder!!!!!

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