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Andy Larkin

Its all a rather damning indictment of football's problem and its final path to ruin…

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I have tried very hard today

to avoid all of the hysteria that has surrounded Paul Lambert and the news

regarding his potential move to Burnley.

Sadly, for me, he missed the golden opportunity to put everyone''s mind at rest

when, at the regular Press Conference this morning, he didn''t make a clear and

unequivocal statement regarding his desire to remain as our manager. He was

probably briefed on his output - what he was and wasn''t allowed to say - by

David McNally and thus they created the problem to which the title of this post

alludes.

I think that Paul Lambert has the potential to be our best ever manager. There

is little doubt that both he and his backroom team have been the pivotal force

in the total reversal of fortunes at our club. Sure, the business side of it is

very important, but if the lads that are in charge of the football side don''t

cut the mustard that all becomes a bit academic. We are a football club after

all - despite previous attempts to prove otherwise.

I have been hugely pleased by his ability to make a substitution that changes a

result. I think that the way he sets his teams up to attack is so refreshing in

the modern game. I believe it is the way that football should be played the

world over. I have even half fallen for the "massive club, brilliant fans,

going places" etc etc and his very public adoration of us has certainly

enamoured him to many thousands of Norwich fans.

And this is the bit where I have become hugely cynical about the game that I

have loved for over 40 years. This two-way love affair can only survive if we

are both respectful to each other.

It is evident that most people that go to the games now appreciate Lambert and

his management style and results. Take the Portsmouth game. We lost 2-0 yet the

players were applauded off the pitch. We were showing our respect of him and

what he is trying to build with our team. And in return he delivered the

platitudes about us, about how we support him and the players etc. Like I said,

a two-way love affair. (Maybe "love affair" seems a bit melodramatic,

but football does that to even the sternest curmudgeon… it allows you a bit of

whimsy).

So, today, when the chance was presented to show us how "special" our

relationship was, our Paul left us feeling a wee bit betrayed. We didn''t want

much, just a simple "I''m staying at NCFC".

Now don''t get me wrong… I know how these things work. I have worked in

advertising and PR all of my adult life. I know how you have to be so careful

about what you commit to the media (see our PM and Deputy PM for how a

misplaced word or two comes back to haunt you). But this no comment approach is

highly divisive and it shows scant respect to the most important people at the

club… us, the fans!

Sadly, football is so riven with hard cash that we are the last people to be

considered in all of this.

There used to be a time that any team in the top flight thought that they were

capable of winning the league title. Nottingham Forest were a great example of

this. A side not that different to Norwich in size and support went on to win

the League and the European Cup, led by a genius of a manager that bucked the

trend with his managerial style.

Nowadays, Cloughie would be poached by Man U, Chelsea, Liverpool etc after a

few months of success. He would immediately be under extreme pressure to

deliver silverware and if he failed in this after 2 years he would be out on

his ear with a tarnished reputation, never to reach the heights again.

Paul Lambert has had a long career in the game as a player. He may not have

been a £100k per week merchant but it is without doubt that he probably never

needs to work again for financial reasons at least.

 

It is widely accepted that

he is ambitious and wants to show what a great manager he is.

 

So… what shows his managerial

skills better?

 

Manage a decent but by no

means huge club to the very pinnacle of the game through your superior managing

and coaching techniques backed by a “progressive” board and adoring fans… or do

it with the “big club plaything” of a billionaire, where any problem can be

overcome by throwing some dough at it to the glee of the latest generation of

plastic fans that turn on you after 3 bad results?

 

We all know the answer to

that don’t we?

Which makes this Burnley rumour so much harder to understand. They are far, far

removed from being a big club.

Yes, a long, long time ago Burnley WERE a big club but they''ve not been one for

decades.… they were deemed to be an average Championship team by us for years.

It was only their promotion season that any of us really took them seriously. The

season when they ran us close for that final play-off place, they were an ok

team, but Stan Ternant (or was it Ronnie Moore?) was definitely getting them

playing way above themselves.

It''s been said a thousand times before but when you stack it up… what does

Burnley have to offer apart from hard cash?

 

The ground is dilapidated,

their training facilities are archaic and their crowds are much smaller than

ours. Now I can''t think of any player nor manager that would rather perform for

a half full stadium over a full one. And would you rather have state of the art

training facilities or ones that need massive investment (I asked a Claret fan

what their facilities were like in case you were wondering where this knowledge

came from)? Would you rather play in a modern, large and sometimes noisy

stadium or a ground that is firmly stuck in the 60s?

 

Norfolk or Lancashire (and

yes, it is nearer to Scotland but hardly commutable is it?)?

 

Is their team really that

much better than ours?

 

So whichever way we look at

it, IF (and it’s a big IF) these rumours have any foundation in truth, then

Paul Lambert will have been lured by money. It will be the 3 more seasons of

parachute payments that they have at their disposal… hardly fair on the other

teams trying to scrape their way to the Promised Land is it?

 

And so we wait… in a land of

limbo where our season (and possibly the next decade of this club) hangs in the

balance. Waiting on this behind the scenes farce to play out.

 

Yes, we can get other

capable managers in, but I think Lambert has that special Cloughie-like ability

to totally transform. I don’t know if others could get as much from our

players. And if we are honest, we all feel like this about his managerial

ability otherwise there would not be this level of hysteria on forums, social

media, the fourth estate etc.

 

And, with a delicious irony

that shows us all how much we have forgotten about this being the beautiful

game, we now face the same misery as the Colchester United fans that we taunted

when we pinched Lambert from their club in 2009. And in turn we will be mocked

by a set of fans that were sobbing about the unfairness of losing their

manager, Owen Coyle, in similar circumstances last year.

 

The Burnley fans don’t appear

to be overly concerned by the many layers of hypocrisy on display now the ball

is running for them. And I should imagine that if he does go, we will replace

him by doing the same thing to Watford or Doncaster or… fill as appropriate!

 

We need to apply a sense of

perspective about this. Although we started the 2009/10 season in the same

league as Colchester United, there can be little doubt that Norwich were a

considerably bigger club even though we had just reached our lowest point and

therefore Paul Lambert’s decision to leave them for us showed a certain

progressive logic. I really can’t say that same logic applies this time round…

asides from cash in the bank, Burnley are an inferior club in league position

and most certainly potential. Surrounded by all of the big Lancashire

Premiership outfits, they will never reach the same level of support enjoyed at

FCR…

 

I had high hopes for Paul

Lambert as our manager. I thought he was going to be different. Sadly, although

it is by no means certain, I think he will be the same as the rest of them…

seduced by money even though he probably doesn’t need it. Be that wages for him

or promise/lack of transfer funds or both. Who knows… anyone but us it seems.

 

Someone needs to arrest this

slide into oblivion that is football’s downward trajectory.

 

Sky’s sponsorship of the

beautiful game has resulted in slush funds being so great, of footballers’

salaries larger than third world countries health budgets, of fans need for

immediate satisfaction – that directors of football clubs always make a

kneejerk reaction to “rescue” their club’s season… and inadvertently ruin

another clubs (and the subsequent happiness of their fans) by starting up the

managerial money go round.

 

Money is totally ruining the

game and our perspective of it too.

 

I know that in other

businesses you don’t get to know of management decisions until they are

implemented… but this isn’t any other business, this is our football club and

our future happiness as supporters that we are talking about here!

 

This whole episode has

become tardy in the extreme. Witness the hordes of reporters outside FCR. WTF

is that all about? Nothing other than filling their 24/7 Sports News channel

with tat.

 

Gah, I don’t know why I

bothered with this rant other than I had to get it off my chest… maybe it is

the feeling that this won’t end well for us just when I though we were getting

our s**t together again.

 

Sorry to have wasted your

time if you have got this far… rant over and I hope I have it all wrong… but

deep down in the bowels of my brain I can’t help feeling that our little

two-way love affair has hit the rocks ‘cos one of us wanted to dip our wick

with a “socialite” that turned out to be a bottle blonde minger… in the cold

light of day… when the champers had run out!

 

And even if he stays… there

will be that nagging feeling that he went and spoilt it all… and we’ll end up

howling in the corner with make-up streaking down our cheeks…

 

I do so hope not!

 

 

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Nicely said Andy. Thanks for the effort to put all those sentences together. You must be thirsty by now(hint),

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Totally agree . I mentioned earlier that if Lambert does go i will chuck football in once and for all , like i say what the hells the point ?

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Andy, when I get to work next week and can access a decent printer I will run your post off, it''s the best and most heart rendering I''ve read on here for many a long season (well until my last post anyway! Sorry).

Seriously you have hit nail well and truly on head. If Lambert wanted to stay here in preference to Burnley he would surely say so and kill all this farce off. He is either hacked off that we declined Burnley permission as he really wanted to jump ship and has been persuaded to stay for ''one more game'' OR he is cynically using the situation to try and extract more cash from a heavily debt ridden club. Either way once McNally became aware of Lambert''s intentions he should have helped him pack his bags!

At the end of the day we need a manager who WANTS to be here. Sure the boy has done a great job and we will always remember this last, glorious 18 months. Pity PL has become blind to what a good thing he''s got at NCFC. He may well find the grass is not as green on the other side of the fence as he thinks. Even if he stays, things can never be the same now between him and the board (and with some, perhaps many of the fans as well). I personally think tomorrow will be the end.     

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Best post of the day Andy by a garden mile amongst all the $hite that certain people have posted. Also highlights the fact until we gain significant investment into the club one way or another a club of our stature warrants these issues will persisit.........

For gods sake a poxy club like Burnley poaching our best manager for many years,they will never be as big as Norwich City NEVER!

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"Sky’s sponsorship of the beautiful game has resulted in slush funds being so great, of footballers’ salaries larger than third world countries health budgets, of fans need for immediate satisfaction – that directors of football clubs always make a kneejerk reaction to “rescue” their club’s season… and inadvertently ruin another clubs (and the subsequent happiness of their fans) by starting up the managerial money go round.

Money is totally ruining the game and our perspective of it too."

Could not agree more. 100% spot on!

What is the point, the beautiful game is just not what it was.

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Yep, this is what I thought this morning too. Very eloquently put too Andy. But, as I''ve just posted maybe there is another truth and some kind of respectful silence is being upheld, which if true, even in itself would show incredible grace - e.g. if he was using silence to protect the club? Could that be true?

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Sky TV didn''t cause Ron Saunders, John Bond, Mike Walker or Martin O''Neill to leave Carrow Road, so I think it slightly unfair to blame Rupert Murdoch, however unpleasant he may be.  Football has always been like this and it always will be.

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As ever, an exquisite post Andy, with the sorry state of affairs we currently find ourselves in eloquently summarised to the finest detail. [Y]As i tend to highlight in my blog, the network of relationships you find within football, from the fans to a club in it''s most general sense, can often be seen to correlate with those of which we endlessly experience in everyday life. Only the levels of emotion are heightened almost beyond recognition!By the end of this relationship with Lambert, we''ll be green with envy of the one left

howling in the corner with make-up streaking down their cheeks!

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Brilliantly put Andy, I could accept him leaving for a prem club even though I''d be gutted but I can see no sense whatsoever going to Burnley especially as we have been doing so well. Feel totally deflated about the whole sorry episode tbh, in some ways I''d rather we gave him permission to speak to him if he wants out rather than keep dragging it on. He must be an absolute idiot if he chooses them over us.

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[quote user="Barclay Boy"]

[quote user="John"]http://www.canaries.co.uk/page/NewsDetails/0,,10355~2261383,00.htmlAndin the midst of all of that, i could almost cry!Just as professional as ever from the man. But don''t you dare leave us on such tender hooks again Paul, or so help me!...[/quote]

Phew, that looks like the end of then, I sure hope so!!

[/quote]To me, he sounds like a man focused solely on his job.He''s clearly quite detatched from the speculation that fuels such torturous angst, and hence, from a PR perspective this situation could have been dealt with far easier than it had been. But our emotions are well behind the priority of success at this club, so i''d like to think Lambert will continue in the same manner he always has.All we can do is calm down and let the man do his job. Lambert has had the same question posed to him countless times over the past year, and his answers have rarely, if ever varied. And his answers are always one''s of great affection for our club.That is the best we can hope for. Pressure him further, and our nightmares may come true. Otherwise we can do no more to keep Lambert here, and if he were to leave at some point in the future, no regrets will justly be kept by the fans.

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Well after all of that heartfelt effort, he goes and spikes my guns the bastard!The sentiment remains the same regarding Sky, our managing of this situation and Burnley being not as good as they used to be… but having read Lambert''s statement I have to say I have regained a bit of that lost love. Still thinks he''ll eventually leave us and the kids for some well-heeled bimbo, but for now I shall give him the benefit and have a try to patch things up without reverting to counselling!

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[quote user="Andy Larkin"]Well after all of that heartfelt effort, he goes and spikes my guns the bastard!

The sentiment remains the same regarding Sky, our managing of this situation and Burnley being not as good as they used to be… but having read Lambert''s statement I have to say I have regained a bit of that lost love.

Still thinks he''ll eventually leave us and the kids for some well-heeled bimbo, but for now I shall give him the benefit and have a try to patch things up without reverting to counselling!


[/quote]

Very true Andy, but today Lambert put himself in the shop window without saying a word.

He let everyone raise his profile and availability by saying NOTHING. Very clever.

It does highlight what the "club" thinks of it''s fans/supporters. Mushrooms anyone! 

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Sorry Butler but as far as I''m concerned it''s all hail McNasty, Bowkett and Lambo.

No one can be sure what has been going on but reading between the lines over the last two weeks certain board members have come ''the old soldier'' and our illustrious trio having arrived from the real hard world have called the bluff.

i thank you

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[quote user="Bury Yellow"]Sorry Butler but as far as I''m concerned it''s all hail McNasty, Bowkett and Lambo. No one can be sure what has been going on but reading between the lines over the last two weeks certain board members have come ''the old soldier'' and our illustrious trio having arrived from the real hard world have called the bluff. i thank you[/quote]

 

yup.....definitely.

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