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CanaryDodge84

Norwich's relegation a blessing in disguise?

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Is this the best position Norwich City FC have ever been in on and off the pitch?

At this present moment in time Norwich City are in probably the best situation on and off the pitch they have been in since those early 90''s and even then we weren''t as well run off the pitch as we are now!

So as many other supporters who are not closely affiliated with Norwich as it''s true supporters keep pointing out...."Norwich are doomed", "all the best players will be sold" etc etc etc

So far Robert Snodgrass looks to be the only one who is on the verge of leaving. My view on Snodgrass is mixed. The lad sure has talent but his argumentative, petulant and on many occassions "no show performances" leave me not really caring whether he stays or goes!?

I remember how I felt when the club sold Darren Eadie, Keith O''Neill, Jon Newsome, Ashely Ward, Craig Bellamy etc when I was younger so Believe me, this is not the view of a bitter supporter, it''s just my view based on what I have witnessed the last 2 seasons. He has a great free-kick on him for sure, but I rarely see him trouble the full-back to the extent where he beats him down the by-line and gets a "decent" delivery into the box. Same can be said for his corners. His general play for me was not note-worthy enough for me to feel any sense of real loss by him moving on!

Leeds fans love him of course! Because they saw him at his best in the Championship where the going is slightly easier than where he has played the last 2 years. My view may have been different had a decent, attack-minded manager been in place to unearth the real qualities that he obviously posses.

Steve Bruce May well unearth these qualities at Hull but the fact that it looks like he is moving to Hull speaks volumes to me as to the only importance in Robert Snodgrass''s life is and that''s Robert Snodgrass. Never seemed much of a "team player" more a "I want all the glory for me" type of player. He just wants prem football and obviously doesn''t care at which club that may be! Hull are in European competition next season. The Prem campaign could well be a real struggle on top of 3 cup competitions and those tedious long flights to and from minnow clubs in Slovakia, Romania, Sweden etc. What will Snodgrass''s next move be then if Hull get relegated which is a real possibility! Will he stay and fight to help the club get promoted again??? Let''s leave time to do its it''s thing on that one and see what pans out.

Back to Norwich though. If we were to lose the "better players" and that''s a very loose term because if a reputation for your previous employer is what makes you a "better player" then Leroy Fer, RVW, Tettey, Hooper etc are prime examples to fit into this category! Did any of these players put in the required quality and effort last season....debatable!

They are obviously not alone in this debate of effort applied but they stand out due to the nature of their reputations before us and hefty transfer fees. The judgement is so clouded as to how good these players are and what could have been due to the hapless management team that existed during their time at Norwich so far. We have seen flashes of brilliance from Leroy Fer.... But not on enough occassions. Is this because Hughton was holding him back on where his real quality lies and that''s in attack and picking defence-splitting passes, surging forward from deep, using his strength, skill and stamina to ease past players....He did all this for his previous employer!

For me, these players haven''t even begun their careers at Norwich yet and in all honesty they should be sticking with the club, honering those contracts they signed and feel excited about the type of football that''s about to be played next season under Neil Adams! If any of these players feel they are better off without Norwich City then we shall bid them farewell and will hold no long-lasting memory between us Norwich fans. If however you do wish to leave some kind of imprint and positive achievement at this wonderful football club then by all means stay! We would love nothing more than to see you succeed next season!

For the ill-informed and less-knowledgable supporters of other clubs out there who keep saying Norwich will be "doomed" due to all the best players leaving.....You are basically talking about 4/5 players with one of those being John Ruddy who has already stated his intent to remain at the club....I feel Mr Ruddy could well be forming a legend status at this club for the future not just with his performances but his commitment and respect for our football club.

Behind those 4/5 players you have the basis of a very strong, determined, quality squad of players who with the right manager in Neil Adams And the right tactics deployed "should" have no problems of having a successful campaign next season with the Canaries. The likes of Ruddy, Martin, Turner, Ryan Bennett, Olsson, Garrido, Whittaker, Bassong (if he rediscovers his form), Howson, Johnson, Redmond, Pilkington, Elliot Bennett, Lafferty, Grabban.....I could go on and on! On top of that you have a whole generation of quality and determined youngsters from the youth side with a "winning mentality" about to be given a chance in the first team under the manager who brought them through the youth system and gave them so much success....(All sounds kind of perfect doesn''t it really??)

I still haven''t mentioned that we are a Debt free football club, we have money coming in from the sale of the likes of Snodgrass, possibly Hoolahan (thanks for your efforts at this club but it''s time to move on) and maybe the likes of the players mentioned further up this post and them parachute payments also.

This football club shouldn''t be demoralised by being out of the Premier League, it should be celebrating a new beginning! We had started to go down a path of big-money signings from abroad who don''t live up to their price-tags or ego and even if we would have stayed up we would have only gone down the same path again only to be in yet another relegation fight because that''s all it''s ever going to be in the Prem without selling your soul to a Foreign owner who will completely rebrand the club and strip it of all tradition and everything it ever stood for. The badge, the stadium name change, the kit change, manager merry-go-round, interfering chairmen and worst of all renaming the club all together!

The Premier League is the most pointless league in the world because if you do have relative success it''s going to bite you harder than a Suarez chomp! Southampton....Finished top half (well done on that, nothing to shout about too much as you don''t get anything for a top half finish and I doubt fans will look back in 20 years time and say "how amazing" it was to finish 8th or 9th! I bet some of them fans will still remember some of LeTissiers belters at the Dell though!) Back to my point....The cost of Southampton''s "amazing" top half finish....Manager has gone, Luke Shaw has gone, Adam Lllana on the brink of leaving, Lovren on the brink of leaving, their talisman Ricky Lambert has gone! Woah!! Talk about taking a backward step!! The club would have wanted to build around those players in the hope of maybe, just maybe raising the bar that little bit extra next season for maybe a top-6 spot! But in this money-ridden premier league there is no chance! Southampton''s chairman could have done no more than just ensure they got top price for all players leaving....There was never any realistic hope of them staying which is very sad. Kids will no longer be able to speak of players as heroes, idols or legends because they will never stick around long enough any more to earn those accolades. And it''s not really the players you can blame?? Sky TV....yep! BT Sport....Yep! Corrupt F.A....Yep! FIFA....Yep! It''s all got out of control financially and there are far too many chiefs at the top benefiting from the riches being thrown at the Premier League for them to even take a step back and restructure everything financially to make our beautiful, fun and entertaining game of football fair again!

As for Norwich, we have a former playing legend as manager....It''s an amazing story which couldn''t have been scripted by a fantasist! Neil Adams joins from Oldham Athletic, becomes a playing legend before becoming the voice of match day commentary on Radio Norfolk and canary call, then takes up a position working with the clubs youngsters and becoming very successful indeed before then being appointed first team manager....Only time will tell if it''s the right appointment but he has earnt our full backing as supporters based on his heroics and success at our club in every capacity he has been in since being affiliated with Norwich City! We have another legend in Gary Holt as assistant manager who has also had success as manager up North....we also have another club legend in Joe Royal in an operations role...a truly dedicated and passionate board who support the club, and have hopefully the club have been able to shrug off them plastic premier league supporters over the summer so we can have our hardcore, full-on singing, true supporters back who won''t get told to "shhh" or "sit down" by Mr and Mrs Brown in front of them who have decided to attend the match as they have seen Man Utd on TV and wanted to see them "live" in a peaceful stadium environment!

We have a club full of positive aspects from top to bottom which is being run by true Norwich City people!

In my opinion we have been relegated at just the right time...."for a reason" if you like! I think it''s given everybody at the club a little reality check and we have to accept all-round that we are not ever going to "rock" the Premier League any more until a drastic change is made into the blatant cheating that is modern day financial rules in football. We simply have to sell out our beloved club of all tradition to even have a glimmer of hope of running with the other foreign-owner run clubs towards the top of the Premier! But you won''t ever see any stadium name changes, kit colour changes, badge redesigns, meddling chairmen or club name changes while our current board are in place... And that''s just the way I like it!

So could every Norwich fan please take a Large dose of reality and just enjoy what next season has to offer and hopefully the club will reward us more vocal supporters with a standing area within the stadium at some point in the future!

We are operating our football club properly! Within financial fair play rules, sensible wage structure, reasonably priced season tickets and putting huge amounts of time and effort into our youth team.....It''s them others who are not playing it the correct way and let''s just hope that one day the money balloon will burst and just football can be the buzz-word again and not "money". Norwich are in very stable hands....It''s all very comforting when you really think about it.

Jamie Ward

Jamiewr84@gmail.com

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Jeez and you expect me to read all that without nodding off?

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Southampton will use the sale money plus the £80 million to bring in replacements and remain comfortably in the Premier.

Snodgrass will work his butt off and rally his team the same as he did for us because he IS a team player and gets p-issed off when his teammates stagger around with disinterest. He''s got fire and some of our regulars ladt season had theirs doused by CH and his relentlessly dull and ineffective game plan.

If we are I. The best position ever by being relegated, you are not a fan of the team. I call "binner".

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................... phew

however I am in agreement with your thoughts - and I would suggest a fair few others are, that was why relegation did not seem to hit fans so hard this timesure players will move on, just as they moved on to to us when we were in the PL we will receive a massive £23m, whilst seeing the wage bill drop and further income from those leavingI''ve no doubt that we will be playing to full houses for most games, and if the football is more positive so will the atmosphere be more positive and vibrantnot only will we have one of the strongest squads in the league, but an awful good bunch of ''youngsters'' coming through - with the money to top it all up come next Janbig fish ina smaller pond - that will do me, if it brings back some of those glorious two seasons of ''09 to ''11

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[quote user="lappinitup"][quote user="ricardo"]Too much for me.[/quote]I read it for an hour and then gave up. [:(][/quote]it can be difficult to keep your finger on the same page that long

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[quote user="City1st"]..big fish ina smaller pond - that will do me, if it brings back some of those glorious two seasons of ''09 to ''11

[/quote]That''s OK if that''s how it turns out, C1st. Whilst most of us are hoping like hell that we''ll be back in the PL this time next year, I guess we''d be kind of satisfied if it was just TWO (good) seasons in the Champ. But, as we all know, the longer it carries on, the more difficult it''ll be. So , with that one caveat, I''ll say that what most of the OP says is true. Oh; perhaps one other thing, and it''s a bit pernickety. He seems to have been tossing the word ''legend'' about rather liberally. Was Neil Adams a City legend ?  Was Joe Royle ?  I suppose the one of the 3 who could just about squeeze in to legend status is Gary Holt. But even that is pushing it a bit. To me a legend is someone like Kevin Keelan, Duncan Forbes, Dave Stringer, Robert Fleck, Iwan Roberts or Grant Holt. Interesting to know what others'' perception of this is .

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Whilst i am optimistic about this season relegation was an avoidable disaster. The club aspires to be in the top league with all its advantages and disadvantages. We are now back to where we were 4 seasons ago albeit with a stronger squad and finances in a good place. We have done to death the mistakes of last season so no need to go there again. If go go straight back up and i am optimistic then no lasting damage will have been done

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We''re £60 million quid worse off, some bloody blessing![:@]

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I wouldn''t say "blessing in disguise" but I get the point you''re trying to make.

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I think that the relegation can be a catalyst for change. Had we not been relegated then, despite the fact we would undoubtedly have had a new manager, the temptation to not really make a lot of change would have been strong.And effecting major change at Premiership level is an expensive business (See Man Utd) so I get the "blessing in disguise" analogy.There will be more players go, but I think that this needs to be the case, I think Adams is looking at a complete overhaul in terms of playing style, which he probably wouldn''t have been able to do in the Prem.

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A good piece and if it was too long for some, then why on earth do they need to tell us. Wiz thinks we are £60M worse off, but that is not the case is it? 60M less £23M for starters, less reduced wages, and running costs. When we see that Hull are paying Snod £60K per week and he is not going to be their top earner, it demonstrates the crazy world of Premiership football. That is surely going to change, and Norwich City will hopefully be very well placed by remaining a well run club without adopting the mantra of Premiership at any costs! The Southampton scenario is indeed a strange one - successful season by not being involved in anything much; no relegation fight, no chance of winning anything; and end up selling off several of their best players. Oh, and the Manager pretty keen to move on.  Well, lets hope we have a good season back in the Championship (just the one hopefully) which will endorse the OP''s point.

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I also wouldn''t go as far as ''blessing in disguise'', but I do think we are in a good position to recover and fight for promotion. Fortunately the club is debt free so we don''t have to ''get rid'' of players to save money. This is a chance to rebuild the squad to suit Adams'' attacking style of play which wouldn''t have suited Snods, but does very much suit both Grabban and Lafferty, two players for the price of one. Suddenly there is more pace and penetration on offer to match the technical skills of RvW and Hooper. The test will be how many more players leave and who comes in to replace them, but so far, so good, IMO.

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[quote user="Jack Flash"]A good piece and if it was too long for some, then why on earth do they need to tell us. Wiz thinks we are £60M worse off, but that is not the case is it? 60M less £23M for starters, less reduced wages, and running costs. When we see that Hull are paying Snod £60K per week and he is not going to be their top earner, it demonstrates the crazy world of Premiership football. That is surely going to change, and Norwich City will hopefully be very well placed by remaining a well run club without adopting the mantra of Premiership at any costs! The Southampton scenario is indeed a strange one - successful season by not being involved in anything much; no relegation fight, no chance of winning anything; and end up selling off several of their best players. Oh, and the Manager pretty keen to move on.  Well, lets hope we have a good season back in the Championship (just the one hopefully) which will endorse the OP''s point. [/quote]A very rough guess would put our income as being at least £45m down. This season just gone it was around £95m. The last time we were in the Championship, which is not long ago, it was £23m. Factor in a bit of inflation and assume a basic income for the coming season of £27m. Adding £23m of parachute money produces a nice round figure of £50m, against that £95m.In terms of expenditure, the significant imponderable (imponderable unless you are in the boardroom) is by how much wages are being reduced from 2013-14 levels by the relegation clauses.

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in a nutshell, the OP will be right if and if only if we go straight back up. The Premierships full of what we all despise, stupid arrogant pundits, stupid arrogant away fans and tourists, big team referees and rich sometimes corrupt owners.

On the other hand we all want to be there, and if some of the players are mercenaries then some can be all time club legends eg Bolton Jay Jay Okocha.

The outlook is much much better than we were last here but it won''t be comforting if we stay down a couple of seasons, in fact a lot of the hard work on finances etc will be undone. We will see

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[quote user="militantcanary"]in a nutshell, the OP will be right if and if only if we go straight back up. The Premierships full of what we all despise, stupid arrogant pundits, stupid arrogant away fans and tourists, big team referees and rich sometimes corrupt owners.

On the other hand we all want to be there
, and if some of the players are mercenaries then some can be all time club legends eg Bolton Jay Jay Okocha.

The outlook is much much better than we were last here but it won''t be comforting if we stay down a couple of seasons, in fact a lot of the hard work on finances etc will be undone. We will see[/quote]Couldn''t agree more with that. If finances were more even between the divisions, I''d probably rather be in the Championship.

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[quote user="PurpleCanary"]Factor in a bit of inflation and assume a basic income for the coming season of £27m. Adding £23m of parachute money produces a nice round figure of £50m[/quote]It''s a huge loss Purps......but is it?If you compare our income with many of the other clubs in the division we are in a very enviable position (obviously there have been several changes since those figures were announced but you get my drift).

Football League Championship club accounts 2012-13

TeamTurnover, £mWage Bill, £mWages as Proportion of Turnover (%)Loss before Tax, £mProfit before Tax, £m
Barnsley9.17.78501.9
Birmingham City24.222.99540
Blackburn Rovers26.936.613636.50
Blackpool2211.65304.6
Bolton Wanderers3537.410750.60
Brighton and Hove Albion23.4219014.80
Bristol City815.219011.30
Burnley15.315.41007.60
Cardiff City17.332.819030.40
Charlton Athletic11.91210160
Crystal Palace14.518.813001.6
Derby County15.412.1797.10
Huddersfield Town11.213.412040
Hull City1725.915225.60
Ipswich Town13.8151099.80
Leeds United28.620709.40
Leicester City19.626.1133340
Middlesborough14.220.714618.50
Millwall12.812.1956.20
Nottingham Forest14.42114617.10
Peterborough United106.2620.0430
Sheffield Wednesday14.911.9803.70
Watford18.112.87100.19
Wolverhampton Wanderers32.131.19730.40
http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/may/22/championship-club-accounts-profit-loss-and-the-wage-bill

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[quote user="lappinitup"][quote user="PurpleCanary"]Factor in a bit of inflation and assume a basic income for the coming season of £27m. Adding £23m of parachute money produces a nice round figure of £50m[/quote]It''s a huge loss Purps......but is it?If you compare our income with many of the other clubs in the division we are in a very enviable position (obviously there have been several changes since those figures were announced but you get my drift).[/quote]Both are true, lapps. It is a huge loss and we (almost certainly) will still have one of the highest incomes in the division.

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[quote user="PurpleCanary"][quote user="lappinitup"][quote user="PurpleCanary"]Factor in a bit of inflation and assume a basic income for the coming season of £27m. Adding £23m of parachute money produces a nice round figure of £50m[/quote]It''s a huge loss Purps......but is it?If you compare our income with many of the other clubs in the division we are in a very enviable position (obviously there have been several changes since those figures were announced but you get my drift).[/quote]Both are true, lapps. It is a huge loss and we (almost certainly) will still have one of the highest incomes in the division.[/quote]Purps (or anyone) ....how does the whole TV money thing work in the Champ nowadays ? I ''m assuming the figures have changed since last time we were in it. Also, I''m taking it as read that we will feature on the live coverage a good deal more than people like Rotherham, Brentford or Millwall.Clearly it''s going to be lot less than in the PL, but, how much less?

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[quote user="PurpleCanary"]Both are true, lapps. It is a huge loss and we (almost certainly) will still have one of the highest incomes in the division.[/quote]This season should prove/disprove T''s theory (it''s all about the money, the manager has little influence) and so we should stroll this league. Let''s hope he''s right. [:D]

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Given how many former PL teams get stuck in the Championship for years in no sense can relegation be regarded as a ''blessing''. That''s why the entire strategy of the club should have been unashamedly short-term in nature with immediate promotion as its only objective. We can reflect on the ''blessing'' of relegation at our leisure if we are looking forward to the Championship again in a year''s time.

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[quote user="Highland Canary"]Given how many former PL teams get stuck in the Championship for years in no sense can relegation be regarded as a ''blessing''. That''s why the entire strategy of the club should have been unashamedly short-term in nature with immediate promotion as its only objective. We can reflect on the ''blessing'' of relegation at our leisure if we are looking forward to the Championship again in a year''s time.[/quote]I would temper that with the fact that the gap has grown even wider in the last season, things are very much biased, financially anyway, in the favour of relegated teams.

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