'Neutral' season ticket holder point of view

[West Ham Canary 0]

I''m a West Ham fan at heart but while I''m studying at UEA i thought I''d get a 10-match Norwich season ticket. I didn''t imagine I''d get quite so emotionally involved and i must admit that Norwich are now my second club. Its such a great club (even if they are going through a tough patch, that i feel will ultimately bring them back stronger than before) with great pies and fantastic supporters. The fans around me in the snakepit are some of the loudest and most passionate fans i have had the pleasure to sit amongst and they deserve better than they got this season.

From a neutrals point of view i feel that there were three main reasons for the catastrophic season. The absurd number of loanees meant that it was impossible to build any team spirit in the dressing room with so many non-canaries in the squad. Glenn Roeder''s decision to opt out of the reserves league cost the team greatly too. Fringe players could not gain match fitness and confidence, loanees could not be tried and tested without throughing them in the deep end. Cody McDonald in particular could have benefitted greatly from playing for the reserves to gain confidence, ease the path from non-league to 25,000 seater stadiums, and i have no doubt he would have been a better player and could have kept us up if he was given this opportunity. Bryan Gunn should never have been given the managerial reins, he lacked the experience and dare i say character to build a strong side capable of putting together a few wins. By all means he should have been given a role, but it should have been a backroom role behind someone like Boothroyd or Ince. Gunn may have the respect of thousands of canary fans, but i can only feel that the players must have wondered what he was doing there. Finally, in 11 games i saw 9 different strikers being used, this can never be a successful policy to follow.

I''ll be back next year (renewed before the first deadline and i don''t regret it) to hopefully see some more goals and entertainment. I am a bit of a serial season ticket holder and was at Wimbledon during Carl Cort''s best ever season. He certainly has a lot to offer and i believe that given an injection of confidence and support he will be the 20-goal a season striker that Norwich need next season. To release him from the club would be a mistake - he has the quality and he will have a great chance to prove himself and revitalise his injury-plagued career in league one (look at the likes of Michael Bridges - and Carl Cort was definitely a better player than him)

Well done everyone for your support this season, i look forward to another seasons of Highs and Lows (just not too low please)