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"Venom" ACN Pod 114
102 Plays1 year ago
4 points away from the playoffs and 4 games since we won - anticlimax anyone? We cover Pukki's contract, Wagner's report card, summer kitty (or lack of), entitled norwich fans, listener questions and guarantees for Great Friday...
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Transcript
Introduction and Match Overview
00:00:22
Speaker
Welcome to Long Come Norwich podcast. I'm joined by John. I'm joined by Claire. Let's get into it.
00:00:31
Speaker
Claire, you were there on Saturday. It's nearly over, at least. Yeah, it does very much feel like that. You just kind of, if it was an animal, you'd probably be thinking about putting it down by now, wouldn't you? I found Saturday, I don't really know what either team were particularly trying to do. Sheffield United were not great either. And if they're second, then that's an indictment on the level of quality in the championship, I think.
00:00:59
Speaker
The whole game, the weather didn't help. It very much reflected what was going on on the pitch and the players skidding around all over the place. Everyone just seemed a bit out of control. The only good thing was like there was a little bit of needle going on on the pitch and Jai certainly liked getting stuck into people. The
The Drum's Impact on Game Atmosphere
00:01:18
Speaker
best bit was when someone tried to tip Max Ahrens over the advertising hoardings.
00:01:24
Speaker
I actually thought the atmosphere was really good in places and naturally they
00:01:35
Speaker
I didn't have this down to talk about early on, but I do think it's worth mentioning that the drum has had a real impact on the away fans level of control of the atmosphere. I was anti-drum. I think a few podcasts back a long time ago, I said, not sure, not sure, but very much now in favor of drum. You're a lot closer location wise to drum than me. Give your drum insight.
Should Stadium Culture Be More Vocal?
00:02:06
Speaker
So I think the drum has done exactly what I thought it would do all along and that is almost unify like three or four pockets of people that we're trying to sing in the Barclay lower and the Snake Pit. So it's like okay here's a call to arms we're all going to sing in time because I'm going to drum for you.
00:02:23
Speaker
And that's what it needed because there are there's lots of people who are legacy season ticket holders who perhaps aren't as vocal as they used to be, but don't want to move away from the atmosphere. That's the whole podcast in itself about, you know, kind of should we be looking to culturally shift the the Barkley and the snake pit? I think we probably should. But that that requires some difficult conversations that maybe the club needs to facilitate.
Managing Atmosphere Against Vocal Fans
00:02:46
Speaker
But the drum, let's say, is that call to arms, is that initial bang, right, let's get behind the boys, when maybe there's a lull in play, you know, we traditionally, we've struggled as a fan base. I thought it was interesting on Saturday that, so I didn't sit in the barclay on Saturday, I took the two kids, and we, unfortunately, the only three seats together were in the upper Joma corner, you know, kind of stand, wherever it is, which is kind of above the ticket office.
00:03:16
Speaker
I observed the same as you that the drum gave us the control of the atmosphere and actually Sheffield United, but let's be frank, they usually come away from home and they're a really vocal fan base that are up for it. They just weren't and they're second in the league until they scored. They could barely be heard.
00:03:34
Speaker
probably a bit of nerves on their part as well, you know, they're second, they've been stuttering a bit, they can see Middlesbrough coming, you know, they were probably... Yeah, and Middlesbrough conceded, didn't they? They went one little behind and that's when they started singing about the fact they were going to go up.
00:03:48
Speaker
Yeah and look they will go up now I think on the basis of that display I didn't think they were any great shakes but they are a team who controlled a game well and just had a lot more class than us and actually look had a midfield and I think Saturday was the first time that I looked at it and looked at Wagner and was like
Critique of Wagner's Strategy
00:04:07
Speaker
his system really wasn't fit for purpose for that game. It was a great big gaping hole in the middle of the park. And that's been apparent maybe over the last four games where Kenny's dropped in between the centre backs or maybe dropped into a full back position to receive the ball.
00:04:22
Speaker
And then it's almost like, well, all right, Gabby Sarah is our best player, so he's now going to be able to beat the three or four bodies that are around him. And then sometimes people are having a go at him when he takes a risk and loses the ball. I mean, it's like he's doing what he can and he's an incredibly talented player, but no one, you know, kind of even, you know, the likes of Messi or Mbappe aren't going to be able to just beat four or five players and then get us, you know, kind of through the third. So
00:04:46
Speaker
The problem we had on Saturday was he is our best player at the moment in terms of he's our best at creative outlet, he's the best at linking back to front and he touched the ball six times in the first half an hour. Did you actually count that? Yeah, because I realised when he gave the ball away twice in 10 minutes because he had one touch and he basically had to do a first time pass both times he received the ball.
00:05:09
Speaker
and so we sort of noticed how little he touched the ball and then yeah we effectively then like well let's just see how many times oh no he really isn't getting the ball like he is not part of the game plan or rather he's not part of the game kind of work so your point of Wagner's plan not working
00:05:25
Speaker
that's the second or third time I've seen Sarah be a complete passenger in the game. Now, whether that is shape, whether that's inability, I mean, I don't think it's a lack of bravery to want to get on the ball because he is incredibly, like I say, taking things first time willing to knock a ball around the corner. And he does, you know, I do think that he didn't necessarily come out of Saturday as one of the worst performers. But in terms of the impact on the game, he did from the fact that he was highly involved.
Team Performance Against Weaker Opponents
00:05:51
Speaker
It's
00:05:52
Speaker
you know going back to going back to where we started off which was just kind of Saturday in Sheffield United and you know it was another one of those um disappointing performances from a application creativity point of view when when the Barclays singing we've had a shot in in celebration after what 75 minutes but when that what what kind of tamely passed for a shot on target happened
00:06:16
Speaker
that tells you what you need to know about the game. It's just so disappointing to not be able to raise your kind of levels, especially against the Sheffield United team, who I completely agree with you, does not. It's a shocking indictment on the league if they are second. But it's a shocking indictment on the league that we're seventh. But that's the thing, you think it's another example of a team that were there for the taking, if only we could have got our third year.
00:06:46
Speaker
I don't think we've got a third gear and I think there's a really good reason for that now is that we haven't got any kind of attacking force, we haven't got any kind of attacking creativity.
Team Structure and Tactical Flexibility
00:06:56
Speaker
I mean who would have thought that Onel and Dowell who have been bit part players for Norwich their whole time here are now the ones that we desperately need to make this work. They were clearly like the key to how
00:07:09
Speaker
Wagner wants to play. We don't have replacements for them really. Putting Eda on the wing is not working. Like we've got three strikers on the pitch but only one of them is playing as a striker. When we've got Gibbs on the bench to fill that gap in the middle.
00:07:25
Speaker
I just I don't know I mean I'm no tactician but to me it's fairly obvious that we need somebody else in the middle to let sarah play his game a little bit more rather than have to do a lot of defensive work and or none and then there's just a great big gaping hole in front of the defense and then the defense get blamed for being rubbish which
00:07:43
Speaker
I don't think they really are. They've just got no protection in front of them whatsoever at the moment. And we've got no creative players to get the ball to Timu or to get anywhere near the goal. Like our first serious shot on target was in the 92nd minute or something, Martinez. That's ridiculous. I thought it was 70 yards. I was readying the girls. I was like, come on, like get near the exit. So as soon as the whistle goes, like we can just go because it was just it was one of those games that was just like,
00:08:12
Speaker
should we leave early? And I never think that, and I never actually do it, but it's like, shall we just go? Because nothing's going to happen. Like, it was just so obvious. And that kind of feeds into the lack of plan B and the lack of creativity that if we're, if we're seriously taken off by Pookie, when we need a goal, I mean, all right, he didn't have a great game, neither did, you know, kind of all three of the strikers that are on the pitch.
00:08:36
Speaker
But Pookie's the most likely to snaffle up a chance or create himself a half chance or, you know, whatever it might be. Well, at the moment he isn't. Well, no, I think he is. I genuinely think he is, like, even if he has to do it on his own. I think he's severely out of form and out of confidence.
Teemu Pukki's Form and Development
00:08:56
Speaker
He is taking extra touches. So he's being starved of service and he is himself
00:09:03
Speaker
ruining the chances that he does get because I think he will do better than a Crystal Scholes or a Liam Gibbs that you know kind of if it's like well they're the players that we're bringing on because we want to change a game like no disrespect to those lads they're both young players making their way in the game but Gibbs is not for me an attacking creative outlet and Scholes is nowhere near the finished product at this stage and looks like he needs a hell of a lot of coaching as does Marquinhos and and that
00:09:31
Speaker
just strikes me as a massive failure in terms of our ability to build a squad this season. I had to look back, I genuinely didn't know, I had to look back at the start of the season because I was like, who the hell were we playing in the kind of wide roles at the start of the season? And it was, we started with Rashidza, there was Campbell, Sinani, Sargent was playing out there. Sinani played the first three, didn't he?
00:09:52
Speaker
And I'm like, we're a world away from what we were. And all right, it was pretty dismal at that point, but at least we were winning a few games and, you know, kind of we were up there because we had felt like we had options. And it also felt like we had options at the end of January when it was like, John Rose going to come back soon. Giolis has come back from, from his loan. Marquinhos has been brought in, but neither of those players. He doesn't look like an Arsenal player, does he? My goodness, he is the world standard.
00:10:19
Speaker
I think they both look like they've got technical ability, but they're just young and raw and need to learn how to play in a set-up. I don't think Wagner's got the time, has he, this season? It's almost just like... It's not the right environment for him to come in. No.
00:10:35
Speaker
Given the injuries that we've got to the players that apparently are key to the way we wanted to play, I don't think he can then step in and be what we need him to be. And he was all right on Saturday. I thought nobody was particularly good, but I didn't think he was awful. But yeah, he's definitely not sort of shining in any way. And I don't think Arsenal are getting much out of it either, really. But
00:10:59
Speaker
Now, I mean, other than minutes and maybe not having frustration of being, you know, not, not even making a bench. So, so having that kind of kind of psychological side of things is the only thing you can maybe say.
Evaluation of Wagner's Coaching
00:11:10
Speaker
So let's, you know, partners now had a, a really solid chunk of season. I was interested in doing a report card from, from your point of view, you know, from, from a, in terms of there's absolutely nothing I would change. I think he's done a phenomenal job, um, through to an ungraded, um,
00:11:29
Speaker
Give me your rating, please, Claire. It's very difficult because at times it looks like an A. There have been games when you think, wow, okay, this is amazing. And then there have definitely been games where it's very much more of a U. Well, no, maybe not a U, that's harsh. I think he definitely passes, but could do a lot better, but there is potential. Needs to work harder. Please see me. Yeah. Knuckle down and you might get somewhere.
00:11:59
Speaker
Okay, so I'm going to push you for a five. What would you maybe see? C minus. C minus, okay. And what about you, Puntylicious? That's exactly what I was going to say actually, C minus, because I feel way more confident in him in terms of like an actual coach and a
00:12:17
Speaker
leader of men than the previous head coach. But at the same time, we haven't really got the personnel available right now. You know, Dalin Hernandez, we've just mentioned, and that is a massive issue for him, that they were his chief creators and they're not going to be back till the end of this month, I think, by the sounds of it.
00:12:40
Speaker
So it's almost like the jury's still very much out. We look like we have a clearer sense of purpose. We look like the players are slightly more motivated, but it's only ever so slightly. There hasn't been a massive uptick once we've had the new manager bounce or whatever you want to call that. There hasn't been a massive uptick in performance. It's just been, okay.
00:13:00
Speaker
And I said to my brother as we were walking home from the match, I feel confident that had Wagner been manager for the entirety of the season that we'd be in and around the playoffs. But I don't know whether that's because this division is just so poor that any coach worth their salt would have easily been able to get us in the top six with the situation that we had in front of us. And we just wasted so much time. But yeah, C minus.
00:13:29
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think we talked about this at the time of the appointment that it would be to miss the playoffs is a shocking indictment on how decision making and recruitment, the time we've taken to change manager.
00:13:45
Speaker
And I don't think he needed the full season to get an origin to play outside. I do think if he, I think if he'd have come late November time, then that would have been enough. Um, because he could have, there could have been more prep going into January. Like, you know, there just wasn't enough time and plans. He could have got some of his own players in as well, where he's got
00:14:04
Speaker
Yeah, even one clear, maybe one more of the type of winger that, you know, because maybe Martinez is as close as they could get to the type of winger he wanted, but naturally by the time that he was appointed, and by the time they'd started those conversations, naturally, they're going to be very late. The one thing I'd say is that this reminds me in a way of my report card on Farca's first season, and obviously he has not had a full first season,
00:14:34
Speaker
The thing I really haven't seen from him is, or what I'm worried about is an inflexibility in, this is the way that I want us to play, this is the way that I want us to set up. And I know he hasn't had a full squad to pick from, and this hasn't been his full squad, but he has had lots of different players available throughout the last few games. He's not like he's in four or five games, you know, we're comfortable into double figures. I don't know if he is,
00:15:02
Speaker
continually trying to implement a system that simply we don't have the players to play. And so that would be the element where I couldn't possibly go over a C minus. And I was thinking D, mainly because of how bad some of the teams that have beaten us this season have been. And I personally think there is enough talent in that squad
00:15:27
Speaker
in performances we have seen in performances we have seen individually performances we have seen this season i have seen eda be an absolute handful run his socks off and be a real presence up front i have seen sergeant harry um
00:15:42
Speaker
you know, relentlessly. I've seen Pookie finish a couple of beautiful goals. I've seen Sarah produce unbelievable man in the match performances. I've seen Kenny McLean spraying passes about. I've seen Max Aarons be progressive and really, really attack and run forwards. I sort of thought Dimmy played, you know, really quite well. I think he's having quite a good run of form although he seems to have to keep coming off to Sam McCallum. And that seems to happen however he plays. So I and I think we've got a really solid goalie. So
Team's League Potential and Playoff Chances
00:16:11
Speaker
But the mitigation around all that, mate, is that, I think anyway, is that when Dale and Hernandez were part of the squad, and we mentioned it about a couple of pods ago, we were tracking it to get two points per game, which is title form, you know, kind of we were after whatever it was, you know, it might only have been six or seven games, but we had had that purple patch. And I would have just loved to have seen, you know, kind of if those two were available for 90% of the games that Wagner
00:16:38
Speaker
took charge of for this season, I think we'd have made the playoffs look, I think we've got beaten in the playoffs, you know, kind of quite comfortably, but you know, it would have been way more of a success. I mean, what we can expect now
00:16:50
Speaker
Do you think they want it though? I don't know, like the fans... Do they want it? We don't really want it. I've been back in North for four days, I've got my accent. I just, the fans, I don't think we really want to go up now. We're like, oh God, you know, we didn't manage to stay up the last two times when we absolutely, you know, crashed the championship.
00:17:12
Speaker
We liked our squad. We liked our squad. We liked how we played. And now we're like, you know, stalling and sometimes it's all right. And sometimes it's not like, we don't want to go up with this. Like, it would be absolutely awful. So the fans aren't really kind of behind the team. And I don't think the players particularly want it. So the one thing I said to the one thing I said in reflection on Saturday, and I think it's the the number one difference between
00:17:41
Speaker
squads on paper I really don't think there's much between us and Sheffield United and at the start of the season you probably would have slightly leaned towards our squad in terms of on-paper ability and what they've done in the game already etc.
00:17:55
Speaker
But they really did look like they knew how to go from back to front. And the runs that the players off the ball were making when attacking seemed to be so much more templated and so much more
00:18:12
Speaker
purposeful. And we, you know, our criticism always of smithball was how meandering and how, how sort of slow logical but yeah, it was slow but it was almost slow because no one ever seemed to
00:18:28
Speaker
have any kind of confidence or predictability about where their colleagues would be. It'd be like, oh, he's available, I'll give it to him. Oh, he's probably available. Oh, yeah, there's a yellow shirt there, that'll do. And I think, obviously, I know they were trying to imprint some kind of replicative, replicable way of getting the ball forward. But we saw it, it didn't happen. Even in the winning run, we didn't win the game, we didn't score the same goal twice, you know, we didn't, you know, so many times, Pookie scored the same type of goal under Farka because we knew how to try and get him slipped in on that back shoulder, et cetera.
00:18:58
Speaker
And I think with Wagner, there is an element that we still, and yeah, okay, he's changed personnel, but that's been forced upon him.
00:19:05
Speaker
That's where I am a bit lower on the grade. I'd say a D because I would have thought by now, he has had enough time with mostly the same 11, mostly, to be able to find a way of progressing the ball regularly, routinely in a similar fashion and to get that directness and to get that purpose and get those players running in that purposeful manner, which you saw, Sheffield United seemed like
00:19:34
Speaker
They really believed in what each other was going to do and we still look like we're in pre-season. We've had the games where we have looked like we're very capable of doing that. The first few games are we scored four goals, four goals.
00:19:53
Speaker
the game against Millwall, which was only four or five games ago, we're perfectly capable of it with the right personnel on the pitch. And I think that that is clearly key now. So if he has the right people on the field, then we can very definitely do that. And that's why I said C minus, because I think he's being hindered quite a little bit by those key injuries at the moment.
00:20:18
Speaker
He should also be able to find a way around that to play better than what we have seen in the last few games as well when she is not doing so yeah.
Assessing Current League Position
00:20:27
Speaker
So fifth or sixth are now what we're playing for so Luton with that win at the weekend are
00:20:33
Speaker
you know, now at 10 points away and it now looks like realistically, unless, you know, Sheffield United, especially with a game in hand now, six points, they are ahead of Middlesbrough with a game in hand, it's going to take quite a stumble now for them not to. So it looks like it's, you know, we're playing for the right to be hosted by Middlesbrough or hosted by Luton.
00:20:54
Speaker
And it is still probably two of six or seven teams that can take those fifth and sixth. So Mill run Blackburn, both kind of got two losses in their last five. Mill will only run two of the last five. We are four points behind them with better goal difference with seven games left.
00:21:16
Speaker
you know, is very much still on it. Does that not terrify you though? I think Middlesbrough or Luton would annihilate us in the playoffs. And you almost feel like under Wagner's Norwich City, the Jekyll and Hyde nature of it,
00:21:32
Speaker
you almost feel like we could probably be either of those teams if we had one of the good Wagner performances. And if we happened to be the first leg, we might just scrape through it because we might just be able to get away with losing two in the second leg because we were already three goals up kind of thing. Whereas we could easily go, we could easily have middle's become four past us. And then we're going to the riverside and we put our best performance on and we never got no chance. So
00:21:57
Speaker
I don't personally, I said ages ago, I would much rather finish ninth than losing the playoffs. I just really would. We can start looking forward to next season sooner. And I still think that will be the end, but I maintain that there was enough talent in this squad to get promoted this season. And I don't think Wagner has done as good a job of routinely and in a replicable way,
00:22:26
Speaker
making those 20 minutes here, 30 minutes there, nearly a whole game against Millwall, etc. He hasn't he hasn't hit upon something because we would have seen it more often. I just simply think you don't have the he doesn't have the personnel available at his disposal right now to come up with, you know, that particular formula or whatever he's trying to stumble upon.
00:22:49
Speaker
Because who was there in a kind of short of Gabi Sarah, who was going to be able to create a chance for Pookie or Sargent or Ida or whoever? There wasn't. Our best hope was a shot from range when we took 92 minutes to get one of those on target.
00:23:05
Speaker
I just, I don't know that we haven't had a chief creator since. Dell has come out of the side and we haven't had a battering ram like on L since, you know, kind of since he came out of the side and they were the only two ways that we looked like we were going to score. It would be, you know, kind of Dell, Sarah Nunez, maybe kind of offering a decent ball or Sarah driving from deep and then maybe having a shot or on L just getting his head down and just plundering it, you know, down the wing and just, just seeing what happened.
00:23:35
Speaker
Those are the ways in which Wagner set us up to try and score goals, and like I say, short of Sarah, who is being asked to play a bit more of a withdrawn role,
00:23:44
Speaker
there really isn't anyone in that side that I see creating chances. I mean, people had started to make comparisons a few games ago that Josh Sargent was a bit like Marco Steeperman, kind of esking in the way in which he was playing. That's a nonsense. That lad looks so short of what he was, pretty well cut. We'll get onto it in a minute, but I think we've got a real dilemma in terms of strikers. I think we've really mismanaged in terms of the way in which we've gone about it with strikers over the last
00:24:14
Speaker
Four seasons, I reckon. Well, let's start there, because one of the things we wanted to cover today was, naturally, attention's are turning to... This is the thing. So many fan media podcasts.
00:24:29
Speaker
at this stage of the season, with the points being as they are, would be almost completely focused upon, you know, the run-in. But I just can't help but just think there's no chance of them doing what they need to do to make up no points. And also, it sounds so odd and almost sort of privileged and
00:24:52
Speaker
I don't know, and we get we get grief from it from other fan bases I know in the championship but I just think I don't want to be in a playoffs with this lot like this lot just don't know I want to be in the playoffs with a team that where they believe in.
00:25:06
Speaker
Yeah, and come back to the number of new songs this season. I think there is a clever people could draw a graph which showed a positive correlation between the fun of following a football team, the success of a football team, the amount of love that fans have for football team and the number of new songs that have been created about individual players or a manager that season.
00:25:30
Speaker
A playoff run is about momentum. We've seen so many teams that come from a long way behind. So often the team that seals their ticket last actually goes all the way. It happens a lot in the championship. Momentum is huge. The way you finish the season is so important.
00:25:45
Speaker
And I just feel like we are backing in. Like if our reverse had three gears, we would be in the slowest of the three reverse gears in terms of like how we would back into the playoffs. So moving towards starting to think about next season, because I almost just want it to be August so that we can try to start again with a new set of plans to get players to get in love with. Start with that strikey situation then. If you were to prioritize it, is that where you think if we were only to address one area,
00:26:15
Speaker
Is that where it would be? And what do you, is there anything that Sergeant Ida Pukey could show you in this last seven games that might make you think differently going into the summer?
00:26:27
Speaker
Well, let's just forget Pookie because we're not going up and as much as, I know we've got a question about this a bit later on in the listener questions section, he's not signing a new contract, is he? Let's be really honest. I can't see any conceivable way that Timu is looking at this and going, this is something I want to be part of for the next 12 to 24 months because it's going to be a year or two if we offer him a new deal.
00:26:51
Speaker
So I think we may as well just start talking in the terms of, and it makes me really sad, but he's not going to be here next season and we're going to have to learn to live without him. And we've attempted to do that this season with limited success.
Should Teemu Pukki Stay or Go?
00:27:05
Speaker
Sergeant, you know, kind of towards the start of the campaign led the line admirably like in a 4-3-3 and
00:27:12
Speaker
look dynamic enough and energetic enough but i think the point that i really wanted to make was i think we've mismanaged and he is now getting stick from the fan base but we have completely mismanaged adamida's development
00:27:27
Speaker
Let's just look at a comparator here. Should we say Carlton Morris, for example, a lad who, all right, was deemed maybe surplus to requirements at Norwich, but, you know, got enough loans and enough first team football and enough goals and assists and the rough and tumble of, you know, the championship and league one under his belt to be able to now prove what he is, which is a really capable championship striker. And he's had a terrific season for Luton.
00:27:55
Speaker
Add a meter if we rewind four years when you know he's scoring might even be five years i'd have to check when he scored hat trick against president the f.A. cut when he started against manchester knighted old traffic right pookie was injured but you know he was thrust into the limelight this was allowed that with the world at his feet and allowed that needed.
00:28:14
Speaker
alone or he needed regular football, he needed to be nurtured and I think out of necessity we have kept him in and around this squad and just not given him enough game time and it's now make or break for the lad you know I personally I still think he needs probably a lower end championship loan he needs to play a load of football he needs to score 10-15 goals next season and he needs to get confidence
00:28:39
Speaker
But we've given him a five-year deal. We've given him an indicator that he's going to be a real big part of it moving forward. And he just looks so short of it on Saturday. But he's not playing on his place, is he? No, but even the basics, like controlling and trapping a ball, I was like, hang on, he's shot at the moment. Psychologically, I think he's shot. And I feel there was lads sitting behind us who I think were from Dubai. And they didn't even know his name. They hadn't watched a game all season.
00:29:08
Speaker
actively deriding him they were saying who's this number 11 you know kind of this guy is is woeful they were googling him and going oh transfermarket.com or whatever says he's worth two million and they were having a real giggle about it i'm thinking this is supposed to be our next big hope for for number nine you know kind of be weird if he was sent out on loan next season like that would seem really odd to me if he was suddenly starting but it should have happened it should have happened two years ago and the reason it didn't happen is because like that we needed
00:29:35
Speaker
We actively needed backup for Pukey and Sargent or whoever else, but I don't know. I think I look at another player.
00:29:44
Speaker
Ballymumba, for example, who wasn't going to get enough game time this season, but might have been able to offer back up to Max and left hand side as well. And we've gone and given him a season somewhere. And actually, all right, he's playing wingback, so he might not come back as the cultured fullback that we want. But he's had a full season of football and his confidence. Yeah, in his confidence is absolutely flying. And I just this is where I say I think we've mismanaged that. I think we need
00:30:11
Speaker
look if pookie's not going to be here next season as much as it pains me to say it
00:30:16
Speaker
Let's just keep him on the bench. Of course I want him here. Of course I want him here. I want another, like if someone said you can have another three years of Pookie, I don't think he massively relies on his pace. Okay, let me position one of my would you rathers in more specific detail. Go on then. So Claire, would you rather have Pookie for, Pookie retires as an orange player by playing another two seasons of which he will amass
00:30:45
Speaker
14 starts, 23 appearances over the next two seasons in whatever league we're in, scoring eight goals in that time. Does that get him to 100? No. I think it gets him quite near Ewan Roberts' 96 or 97.
00:31:02
Speaker
Would you rather that he leaves at the end of the season with our last game, last home game of the season, we know that there's nothing to play for. So it can be a full, and we already get the announcement that he's leaving beforehand. So we get to do a proper goodbye. We love you, Teemu. And he then goes and has one more contract at a Europa league outfit and plays
00:31:27
Speaker
45 games and scores 20 more goals and has a really great end of career, but not in Norwich and not in England. I would want the former because I would want to see him and for him to retire as a Norwich player and for him to be given the chance to get his 100 goals. I don't believe this is going to happen by the way, but that's what I would choose.
00:31:49
Speaker
and that he goes with our best wishes at the end of his career. We still give him his last ever game and then that's it. We never have to see him playing another shirt because that would hurt no matter where. I have a feeling he might go back to Scandinavia if he does leave at the end of this season. I think that's probably what's going to happen. I think he wants to go somewhere near home.
00:32:13
Speaker
but I don't want to see him playing in another shirt and I don't want him to score 45 goals for another team. I want him out of courage, but I don't think that is what's going to happen. So my thought process on the would you rather was, I love teaming so much that I almost think we are now holding him back from finishing with the career stats that he could have. I don't think that we have
00:32:37
Speaker
Have we not given him the career stats that he's got? Yeah, completely get that. However, to your point about mismanaging the strike situation, we have mucked up providing him with opportunities to score goals so badly. We need him to stay and then to get someone in that can give him... Would you trust this team? Would you trust the recruitment to do that? We used to be able to recruit for the championship, but now we see... I think we're already in the building.
00:33:06
Speaker
I think they are already in the building. If we shaped the way in which we played, you've got a Marcelino Nunez, you have Kieran Dowell, you have Gabby Sarrat, who are all perfectly capable of... He's the starting 11. That guy is shot. He can't trap a ball.
00:33:20
Speaker
i think if we here let's get come on he looks an absolute shadow of the player we got yeah he's a gedel yeah but he wasn't he when he's you know he's most recent there's a player there oh 100 there's a player if he's given a proper pre-season this season he'd already played quite a few games yeah that's a hell of a shout as well yeah you're right but i think if he's
Marcelino Nunez's Role in the Team
00:33:44
Speaker
provided with a bit of a rest, a full preseason, proper acclimatization to this league and this environment that he's in. He loves it here. He is one of those ones that I think it was Edie that called him one of our happy, lovely boys. He is a happy, lovely boy. He is someone who the fans can get behind. He's got moments of magic in his boots. There is no doubt about that. I think the issue for me is,
00:34:12
Speaker
Where do we play him? Because he's not quite a holding midfielder. He's probably a bit more of a number eight. Adam Brandon would come back on and tell us exactly where he should play. We've tried him as a number 10, actually, probably only five or six games ago. He scored two goals in the number 10 position. One of them was an absolute worldie. I think there is a player there. He's the only person who's really set up in the way that's the end of the game. And this is what I mean. Look, he's not the second coming of Emi Buendia as much as I would love him to be.
00:34:41
Speaker
but he is a player that has- He's a lot happier. Yeah, he is a lot happier and will get sent off less, but he's got creative talent and I think that's what we're so badly short of at Norwich at the moment. So I think if we can get him and Dowell on another contract, we could feed Pookie and we could feed Pookie for another
00:35:01
Speaker
two or three seasons and if it was three seasons look he could probably become Norwich's greatest ever goalscorer because I think that's 132 something like that three seasons it's not beyond the realms of possibility Billy Sharpe's playing and he's still 59 or however old he is so do you think do you think Pookie would yes I mean I guess that it's whether or not the negotiations would have to go along the lines of
00:35:28
Speaker
We'll give you two more years of which one of them we expect you currently to be the starter and then it might be that in your second one it may well be that you are more of a feature from the bench.
00:35:40
Speaker
We're not giving him a three-year contract, are we? I am, but that's just me, the old romantic. But the reality of the situation is he is after one last payday, I think. That's what his agent is trying to drum into him. So a three-year deal provides that to him. I feel like we mucked this season up and we should be in a position to give him, with our Premier League money that we should be getting from August, we should have been in a position with this squad to go back up and give him another Premier League payday.
00:36:07
Speaker
That sounds very entitled, but I do kind of agree with that. No, I think squad-wise, we had the ingredients. Compared to Luton, Millwall, Blackburn, the teams that are currently occupying the positions we should at least be in, if this was like a board game, we set off several squares ahead of them in terms of
00:36:30
Speaker
you know, resources, the assets that we should have been able to utilize. So that is kind of where I'm getting at with that would you rather of I almost love Pookie so much that I want the best for him and I feel like we could be an absolute car crash again next year and I would what I don't want is for his Norwich career to peter out and for him to have two seasons like what he's just had where you just look at him you think god you don't look like you think you're going to score
00:36:56
Speaker
That's very unselfish of you, which as a football fan is amazing, well done. He does the face in the shirt thing when he's really, really frustrated, which he does just after we've given the ball away for a goal or just after he's missed a chance, he knows he should do better. There's no international football this summer, right?
00:37:13
Speaker
So a decent rest this summer and some proper reinforcement in the midfield or some proper strategizing for a way to play Nunez and make him look like the player we signed.
00:37:26
Speaker
then yeah and of course I'm all in for that but I think you're right that he's probably going to go and find another offer. We might get lucky that the right club might not be on the lookout for someone at his stage of his career because he isn't going to have
00:37:44
Speaker
the same number of opportunities in terms of clubs he would go to as even three years ago because he needs you know he needs someone who wants to add a striker to their mix who are going to be in either a league where he would immediately be a first choice goalscore and there's not that many top flight leagues
00:38:04
Speaker
that where he's going to be good enough to kind of go in straight as a scoring striker. Will he want to go someone who's fighting relegation and probably not get much service either? Probably not either. So you're probably looking at one of the Scandinavian leagues where one of the bigger teams can bring him in and he knows he's going to be part of the two and he's going to get lots of goals.
00:38:23
Speaker
So, it may well be that if he was going to go, it's April, would we have heard a rumor already? Especially with agents, would we not have already heard sort of Pookie linked with a move to Malmo, Pookie linked with a move to young boys? Do you know what I mean? I feel like that would have already happened if there was an obvious person who was going to retire at the end of the season and they needed a replacement. I don't know if we would have already heard some whispers on that front.
00:38:49
Speaker
The noises that he's made publicly are, let's get to the summer and then I'll have a think about it. Like, I don't even want to contemplate my future. And that's, you know, when he's directly been asked that at Finnish press conferences about his future, and if there's been rumors swirling around, he's always couched it in those terms. That's because he's a gentleman. Yeah, I can say that. He is an absolute gentleman. I expect respect and courage, isn't it? And that is the, you know, speaks to the class of the man. And that's why I want him here for three more years.
00:39:18
Speaker
Well, I hope we get it. I do hope we get it. The unselfish perfect, what I want is I want to have every last little drop of energy the man has to be in a Norwich shirt.
Funding Allocation: Infrastructure vs Squad
00:39:31
Speaker
It goes back to the pod we did specifically about recruitment a couple of months ago. I don't currently have faith that we would
00:39:39
Speaker
strike lucky with who the new person is because you can't go into it. You simply can't tell me that we're going to go into a championship season with Sargent or Ida as the number one striker. And you can't tell me that we're going to go into a season with those two as well between the two of them. That's enough. We're not scoring 35 goals between those two next season. And now either one of them could become Norwich City legends and
00:40:02
Speaker
But you can't bank on that because it would be a surprise if either of them did it, right? You can't. No, no, I think Josh Sargent potentially could because when he was playing as the lone striker, he was banging the goals in and then it was an issue because, you know, Pookie became fit again and then you can't not play Teemu because he's Teemu. I think that is the problem. If Teemu wasn't Teemu, then I think Sargent would probably be our number one striker. But I think we would still be playing this formation that doesn't fit the players.
00:40:32
Speaker
Well, no, but I do think that Josh, I can't say his name, Josh Sargent, could bang a lot more goals in than he has done this season because he did show that early on that he was capable of doing that when he plays as the striker and the only striker. Is there one other area, Claire, other than strikers and forward positions that there's anything you want to see, last seven games before you make your decision? Or a defensive midfielder would be a dream, wouldn't it?
00:41:02
Speaker
What's one of them? I hear that Alex Teddy's available still. I don't know if maybe that's our cursive
00:41:18
Speaker
of the joy that we had in that short period of time. Maybe our penance for the kind of the rest of our Nora City lives is that we're never going to have it. There will never be a defensive midfielder who can stay fit in a Norwich show. A cursed. Yeah, that's sort of like a cursed position. Yeah. We had a season of Ollie Skip, didn't we? You got injured in the last game, didn't you? Oh, yeah, you did, yeah. Yeah, I didn't play the last game. Great show. Yeah, he was in the boot for the celebrations, yeah. Yeah.
00:41:44
Speaker
Yeah, well, Kenny was in the boot for the celebrations, wasn't he? That's not going to stop Kenny. Bless him. He was on the crutches now, didn't he? Right, before we go to the list of questions, there is a game coming up that we would like to make sure everyone is aware of. Is that not right, John?
00:42:00
Speaker
That is right. We haven't talked about it and I think we should talk about it, purely because we've been massive advocates of the Norwich City women's team and there is a huge game coming up at Carrow Road. It is massive. They've sold 5,000 seats already. From what I'm told, they've nearly sold 6,000 seats. I was there on Sunday and actually it was really nice to see that there was significant support up at the nest.
00:42:25
Speaker
they play a wonderful brand of football. They play a brand of progressive passing football out from the back with creative players and pacey wingers and I was like oh this all feels a little bit farcable and lovely to watch and I just think
00:42:42
Speaker
Look, the more people get behind that team, the more eyes are put on them, the more exposure that they're provided, the more it will bring sponsorship into the club, the more it will bring revenue into that team, and the more it will allow them to become self-sustainable. And that's what we want. We can petition the club to start spending a million, two million pounds on the women's set up each season. It's simply not going to happen. That's the kind of thing that
00:43:11
Speaker
Typically, I think a bigger club would do to make sure that their team propels up the pyramid. We're not going to do that. So let's get behind them. Let's get sponsorship into them. But actually, just go and give them your support because I can tell you from speaking to people around it, it's really important to those players that are going to be playing on the 16th of April, and it will be.
00:43:31
Speaker
a brilliant occasion. We will be there doing some flags I would imagine we will you know kind of get behind them as much as we can but I just think it's it's so important that we show support to a team that's had a really good season as well and a team that deserves um you know a cara road match they're gonna get two now because they've got a cup final to play in as well but
00:43:55
Speaker
The more people go, the more likely it is that it will happen with more regularity. So get yourself down there. I don't think they're going to open another stand. I think they will just continue to sell the river end out. So there's probably, I reckon there's probably only a few hundred seats left, but don't delay is what I would say. It might be the best performance at Carrow Road in this running. The match that I've enjoyed most of the season attending was a 3-2 win for the women's team at the Nest. It was absolutely brilliant, really enthralling.
00:44:23
Speaker
Yeah. See you there. And now it's time for a list of questions. Oh yeah. Right. Where should we begin? We have Matthew McGregor on Twitter. And I look at this every week, this situation. Claire, we'll start with you. How nervous does the idea of Derby Days returning to Carrow Road next season make you? And can you guarantee what the results of each game will be?
00:44:46
Speaker
it makes me feel physically sick. They will, without question, win at least one of them. So yeah, that's how much I'm looking forward to it. Come on Plymouth and come on Sheffield Wednesday. Yeah, I think they'll blow the playoffs if they don't get automatic. Well, that's what I'm convincing myself that that will happen. But yeah, I'm kind of of a similar mindset that
00:45:13
Speaker
Football, oh God, I've said this a lot, but football is cyclical and they will have their time in the sun again. And maybe it's coming because, and I think maybe Weber was doing this in a recent, I don't know if anyone listened to the most recent training ground guru podcast with Stuart Weber when he was on there. He was effusive in his praise of Kieran McKenna. And I just thought, are you trolling our fan base again there? But, you know, he, he really was and really seemed to rate him as a coach.
00:45:41
Speaker
And I think they've got a good thing going. I think they've poached a lot of people from Norwich City Football Club as well, which is, you know, kind of a slight worry. Yeah, have behind the scenes. Yeah, absolutely. I really feel like they've got their act together now and they're doing some really good stuff in the community. And actually their women's team is absolutely smashing it at the moment as well. I think they were about seven or eight games unbeaten. It just feels like they're on the up and we have, yeah, stalled. That's the right way. Thomas, what do you think?
00:46:11
Speaker
They're not coming up. They're not going to go up automatically and they are going to lose in the playoffs.
Reflecting on Past Performances
00:46:23
Speaker
It's a shame for them but they can go again next season. I think they will come up automatically and the reason I say that is that
00:46:31
Speaker
There is too much muscle memory from Sheffield Wednesday in terms of fucking up. And I think they will screw it. And my mate is a huge Wednesday fan. And he's like, we haven't got the stomach for this. Like we won't, we won't do it. I very much hope he is wrong, but we shall see. Right. Anyway, next we have Elizabeth Caldwell.
00:46:51
Speaker
Who says, is it just me or is anyone finding it difficult to muster any enthusiasm whatsoever to think of any more questions about this season? And I guess, Tom, that speaks of a complete, like what you were saying earlier, it's completely mad to me that we are four points off the playoffs and could easily, with a fair wind, just sneak in and then do something, a la 2001, 2002, when we got to Cardiff, and we just,
00:47:19
Speaker
Someone said to me the other day, it's four points, but it feels like 400 points. Yeah. I mean, it almost feels like instead of seven games left, there's 700 games left. I just can't believe the season still hasn't over. It just feels like it's gone on for ages.
00:47:36
Speaker
I mean, look at the running order of the pod. We've got a few games left, but we're already starting to talk about how we make changes for next season. And it's not all how we're going to open the Premier League or whatever. It's not because we know you've got someone retiring. We're manufacturing situations where we think we need to make changes. You shouldn't be chasing promotion and talking about how you need to change and improve the squad, right?
00:47:59
Speaker
That is not the mindset you're supposed to be in as a football fan when you're following a team who are, in theory, inverted commas battling for promotion. I mean, obviously, Wagner has to keep, whilst it's so mathematically within reach, I mean, insanely so. Two results need to go our way versus one of the two people in that position.
00:48:20
Speaker
five of them, we can match the results. So we're not exactly talking like we need title winning form even necessarily, because no one seems to be able to string to, no one beneath kind of, well, no one beneath Burnley seems to be able to string together three wins at the moment. So, you know, it's a whole mixture of kind of greys and reds in the form table. Do you know what though? I know everyone's moaning about this season, but
00:48:46
Speaker
I'd just look back at the points tally under Daniel Farka's first season and we had 57 points, which is what we've got now, after 45 games in that first Daniel Farka season. Were we all sitting around being mare and moaning then?
00:49:05
Speaker
We were before that. Tom was. Tom definitely was. I remember it well. Before that scum game, they were two managers under pressure. When we went away to scum, we were both in the bottom three or both in the bottom four, we both started the season really, really badly. October, November time, it was pretty doomy and gloomy and then obviously everything started to
00:49:28
Speaker
You started to see green shoots of some kind of plan, some kind of progress, but there were things on the report card that we wanted to see improvement in the following season in order to fully buy in. Obviously, I was much slower to buy into the project than others, but the problem with this season is there's
00:49:48
Speaker
I think we have been hurt by injuries at just the wrong times. I do think that that has played a part in maybe the songs being written, the songs being sung. Sarah is probably the only person who's hit form and then not had an injury quite soon afterwards. And he's got a good song. We have always had that curse for quite a couple of seasons now where someone hits form and then immediately gets injured.
00:50:13
Speaker
Well look, what better example than Hernandez and Dowell, Wagner manages to get this new manager bounce and literally the two players who, we recorded a podcast saying that they're like night and day what they were like before he came in, hasn't he done a great job getting a tune out of them and then all of a sudden they're not available for nearly all of the running.
00:50:33
Speaker
So I do feel that we have been unfortunate with timing of injuries this year. And that has played a part in the fact that it never has felt like we've built up any momentum, really. It has felt like having to constantly almost try and reinvent ourselves or almost constantly trying to start going on a run.
00:50:54
Speaker
And Millwall felt like we'd had three or four results in succession at that point. It felt like, right, we've cracked it. And we talked after that pod. No one was saying, look, we're going to fall out of the top six. It was all just, well, we're going to make the playoffs and we'll probably still make it. And it'll be fine. Yeah. And it's all fallen apart in four games because of two players getting injured. And that is how threadbare our squad is in terms of attacking options.
00:51:20
Speaker
Which kind of leads into the next and last question from Johnny R on Twitter, who asks, will either Pookie or Norwich realistically be able to do better than extend the contract by another season, which I think we've talked about. I think he can do better, but we'll see. But his other question is, could we convert Liam Gibbs into a number 10 to play in behind Pookie's given the intricate through ball service that he's been cruelly deprived of in the current system?
00:51:46
Speaker
I don't see that enough of him as an attacking out there. I don't think he's good enough on the ball in that kind of way. I think he's a really tidy player who hasn't had anything like the number of minutes we would have liked his development this season. I think that the way that we set up means that Sarah and McLean are just way better at what he would be asked to do were he to be in this current setup.
00:52:07
Speaker
so he hasn't had the chance to develop the way that maybe we would have liked. He certainly has shown promise. I honestly think that we have in the squad the people to play that type of through ball. It's Sara and it's Nunez and it's basically your, or Dowell, and it's your job, Mr Wagner, next season to find a way to get one of those three players in the right position regularly enough to play that ball through.
00:52:34
Speaker
All three of them. Just go nuts like that season where we had Buendia... No, but we have played in that way. We had Buendia, Dowell and Campbell all started regularly towards the back end of the 2021 Campbell. But seven past Huddersfield, didn't we, with that kind of testing? Exactly. And I think Dowell came on and then scored twice. No, he started. He started and... But Claire, can we convert Gibson to a number 10? That was the question. No, and like you guys said, I don't think we need to because we've got other players that would do it better.
00:53:02
Speaker
Well, we might need we might need Gibbs to be CDM next year because we're going to have to sell any chance of buying extra players because we're going to have to do the pot soon where who do we sell? Fucking hell. If we don't get it, the only chance we've got of buying players, unless there is something in the investment that Michael Bailey says there isn't. If you listen to the previous part where I was hoping he was going to say, well, yeah, there is an outside chance that
00:53:29
Speaker
and you know he pumps some money but you know according to bailey what what this ownership group do is they pump money into the facilities in the surroundings in the environment which i feel like we've been hearing for the last five or six years without them but anyway um look i love your veg packs look i love your swimming pool um but six million pounds swimming pool but let's
Selling Key Players for Future Improvements
00:53:47
Speaker
not forget
00:53:47
Speaker
Anyway, that's another teaming contract. And I'm not necessarily against us investing in the infrastructure like that. It's just when you've got six million pound swimming pool that's coming up at the same time as, we probably need a bit of money for players at the moment. It's a hard sell, isn't it? No, it shouldn't even be mentioned.
00:54:06
Speaker
The his old point was he doesn't think that there is going to be investment in the playing squad from in the actual way. So the only way therefore we can survive is selling the only assets. We think we would get enough money to make it stomachable to lose. Aaron's is an example of if there is a Premier League team looking to strength or European team looking to strengthen that area. He's one where you go.
00:54:30
Speaker
I would love to see you reach the heights of your career at Norwich. However, I do think your ceiling is Champions League football. I do still think he's got that ability in him. He would need coaching. He would need time to get there. But I think he's good enough to do it. England on the 21s keep picking him. I think we could get a decent enough money, some of money for him that as painful as it would be to see him go. We think you've been a phenomenal servant to us. And we think you could hit the heights. Thanks for the money. It'll help us rebuild a squad.
00:54:58
Speaker
Sarah is probably then the next name, unless you can think of one who is our next most saleable asset after Aaron's. He's got to be Sarah, surely. I mean, he's basically the only guy in form. Apart from Gunn, I don't want to sell him. And I don't think you'd get as much for Gunn as you'd get for Sarah. Probably is Angus, you're right. He'd be the next most saleable asset. I think you almost have to try and whip up a bidding frenzy for those two and then find a way of building a squad around Nunez and
00:55:29
Speaker
And that also makes it tricky for the Puke contract negotiations because you're then saying, okay, so the best midfielder is being sold. You want to give you three years. You might have to pass to yourself. Can you take corners and then run into the box and nod them in? I think that is...
00:55:47
Speaker
I think that's the summer that we're looking at, unless we do somehow stumble into the playoffs and somehow, you know, all of Middlesbrough get food poisoning the night before Wembley. Unless something like that happens... Well, their coach turns up late. Well, well, two hours late. I mean, even then there would be enough three hours late. I just, I can't, I can't see how it's going to happen. But then as we've talked about, and we'll do a whole podcast at the end of the season, I think that there will be
00:56:15
Speaker
I think the Atanasio contingent will experience how quickly they can fall out of favour with Norwich fans if it gets halfway through the summer and it turns out that they're spending money on swimming pools and veg patches and not putting money in the squad. For balance, I don't think we've spent that much on the veg patch, mate.
00:56:35
Speaker
No, but I think the point is that I personally will, and I don't think I'm quite at the visceral, most unfair end of the spectrum, I'm far more unhinged than you are.
00:56:51
Speaker
There are far less logical and reasonable fans than me and I will be furious if we finally have someone who in theory has got money that's got a massive stake in our club and they are not helping us through a financial issue with the playing squad to equip to go again. I'm not the sort of person who writes on bedsheets. However, there are the people who do write on bedsheets. If they were cross with Delia, think how cross they're going to be with someone who actually has got billions and isn't spending it.
00:57:18
Speaker
But I think that's where the venom will be aimed at the people running the club rather than the people investing in the club. Because I think, look, they are about to pump a load of money in the football club. All right, in return for a massive, probably like 20% stakeholder in the club. So they are going to become, if not the biggest shareholder at the club, kind of pretty much equal with Delia and Michael in terms of their share.
00:57:46
Speaker
I think that the way in which that money is spent, I think, is up to Stuart Webber, is up to Zoe Webber, is up to Sam Jeffrey, you know, and whoever else we've got running our football club. I think that the strength and the weakness of the football club, as I have said many times on this podcast, is that we implicitly trust who we choose to run it without as much scrutiny maybe as we would have all
00:58:10
Speaker
have liked and I think that sometimes is the failing of the board collectively to maybe not hold them to account because they're trusting football people or who they think are football people to run the club and so if Stuart Webber or Zoe Webber or whoever
00:58:28
Speaker
decides that, you know, with this extra, let's just say it's 45 million quid, you know, for example, number it in a finger in the air job. If they say we want to spend that in on our Academy and the Carrow Road master plan to make sure that we have, you know, 35k stadia, I think they'll go with that because they will think that's the, you know, the best thing that's chosen by the best people that they've got to run the best football club ever.
00:58:55
Speaker
I'd like to see them explain the business plan of two, three years removed from parachute money. How many season ticket renewals they think they will be if they are serving up drafts because the playing staff has dropped so much in quality.
00:59:15
Speaker
Um, you know, it's, there's no, there's no parachute payments. There's no Premier league money. There's no big TV money. There's going to be another set of teams coming down who are going to get a lot of the sky featured games. And Wagner's worked wonders with in, in partnership with Weber before. So, so this, you would imagine you basically got, you know, this is his first window of, of the, the W and W fagnolution together, um, working on, on, on bringing in players.
00:59:43
Speaker
There'll be a level of confidence that they should be able to pull together a squad, but if they financially are having to sell in order to buy, I don't know. This season has been such a stuttering misfire, a series of good performances followed by three bad ones, that I almost feel like confidence is so low in what this squad can achieve together.
Speculating Future Game Outcomes
01:00:09
Speaker
It's going to be a really big sales job to try and get us brought in again for this upcoming next season. But a lot of that might be, and this is why I asked a question around what might happen in the next seven games.
01:00:25
Speaker
It is possible, it's in the realms of possibility, because we have sort of seen it, that we could win five of the last seven, four of the last seven, and whether or not that is enough to finish in the playoffs or not based on other people's results, because it's not in our cans, if we did get, you know, if we, let's say we go unbeaten, but in like a good way, not in the recent shit draws way, if we go unbeaten for five of the last seven, and actually finish with a bit of momentum, and we just miss out on the playoffs,
01:00:52
Speaker
I feel that narrative is much more positive going into the season because you can go, well, if only we'd have got Volker sooner. And he can say, look, I didn't quite get the way I wanted to go, but we know we, you know, I love that we had the hunting mentality and we averaged two points a game nearly and we didn't quite blah, blah, blah. Then, you know, that's different, but I just feel like.
01:01:08
Speaker
As much as we keep saying it, the issue is we keep turning out these turgid performances where you can't see where the goals are coming and you can't see why you would get on the edge of your seat and you feel like you're there out of habit rather than belief that something special is happening. And I don't know if you can manufacture that without signing. I don't know if you can take us from where we are, like without the games to play. So the games can do it. You know, we can finish in a way that gives us performances that sends us into the offseason feeling really comfortable about where we're at.
01:01:38
Speaker
But if we don't do it through performances, and I don't trust this team to do on performances, that can only come from an influx of
01:01:46
Speaker
you know, either great news on we retain Pookie and here's the guy that's going to do the setting up or here's the person who's going to strengthen that defense or here's the winger that's actually in the mold of Wagner and the way he wants to have a winner. So there you go, the other side of Hernandez and that means that Ida and Sargent are always going to be two odds or whatever. No, I don't think if we're told there's not a big money signing or two, can't see what is getting us excited in August.
01:02:12
Speaker
Plus the fact, I think you touched on earlier is concerning the type of teams that will be joining us in the championship are going to be huge clubs by the look of it. You know, it could be Everton, it could be Leicester, probably be Southampton. They are big hitters. They're going to have a lot of money. Yeah. They're going to get the TV games. Like you said, you know, we're going to have to really go it next season.
01:02:38
Speaker
to get anywhere, let alone the fact that we're going to probably struggle in the first place. So yeah, that's another factor that is a concerning one.
01:02:49
Speaker
Well, that's kind of my point from the business plan point of view. If you're making the case, if you're making the case that this is where we should spend the money. No, we need to spend the money trying to get out of the Premier League. And yes, sorry, getting out, getting into the Premier League. And I guess we do quite well at getting out of the Premier League. Setting the club up to be good after we're gone, etc. Should I say this? Yeah, I'll say this.
01:03:17
Speaker
I think that is a cowardly thing to say.
01:03:21
Speaker
And the reason I say that is, whilst it's an honourable thing to say, it almost excuses you for bad performance in the things that matter on the pitch. Because if you say, my most important thing is setting this club up to be in a really good, stable environment going ahead, of course I want that. I want my grandchildren to have a football club to go and support, but I've got a similar culture to some of the best Norris City family cultures that we've had. Of course I want that. That is really important.
01:03:50
Speaker
But if you tip the balance too much that this is where if we get a big influx of investment, that's where it needs to go. Part of me thinks that's something you can then hide behind because you can then say, well, we didn't say we were going to invest in the squad and we didn't have the money to really go at it in the transfer window because we were focused so much on legacy. Well, it's not easy to do the legacy if you're in the Premier League.
01:04:13
Speaker
I think the club and Stuart Weber in particular wants a recruitment model that is self-sustaining. I think that's where he's at and that's why we've dipped into markets in South America. We'd previously dipped into markets in Europe where they saw that there was value. I think they are big believers in that model where you're going to pluck players and they've got high windows and the coaches that we employ are able to add that value to them.
01:04:40
Speaker
And that's why I think we might go in that direction. I don't think it's cowardly. I think it's admirable. I think it's completely where I'd want people running my football club to be, that they'd set them up so that the football club is here in 25 years.
01:04:55
Speaker
So I kind of disagree with you on that point, but I see the logic that if we've got a load of cash, why aren't we spending it on players? I think there has to be a balance now. And I think that the club has tried to strike that balance maybe with the likes of Sarah and Rashida and Sargent. So we've started to take that kind of step into
01:05:13
Speaker
more sizable transfer fees, but we've just got to do better at it because there's so many failures for one or two really good ones that we've signed. And I think that's where the football club has gone wrong significantly over the last two, three seasons. We've spent big money on players that, with the exception of Sarah, we don't see any value from. You can't sell them on really now, can you, for any kind of profit? And that is a failure. That's a massive failure.
01:05:39
Speaker
Yeah, and I guess it's, I mean, cowardly is a motive term, but I guess that's kind of, it's almost, I find it impossible to take that mindset of wanting to, if we get a big investment in the amount of money we want, you want to really drum up how much we're leaving for the come after us.
01:05:58
Speaker
I don't think, look, let's be frank, I don't think Stuart Weber is the kind of guy who's scared of taking a risk when it comes to a transfer strategy. I think it's just, but it is about upscaling his recruitment strategy from when we got all the Germans, so many Germans in, and then making that a bit more fit for purpose for championship going into the Premier League. I think that's where I want us to be.
01:06:24
Speaker
Can I just say one bit of infrastructure I would like them to spend some money on is the leak in the upper Berkeley roof that was dripping on my head for the entire game, like some sort of water torture, which it was watching the game, let alone on my head.
01:06:43
Speaker
As a person that has thought about moving his season ticket to the Upper Barkley next season, could you just offline just tell me exactly where you sit so I'm not... Don't sit in line with the seam of the roof. That's exactly where I sit. It's the joint of the roof.
01:06:58
Speaker
Like the headline at an SEO is to pump 15 million into football club and then like in the small print, they're fixing leaks. We fixed the leak lads, get in. That's all I care about. Let's have some guarantees then. Let's have some guarantees. Claire, what is the score going to be in this massive playoff crunch match against Blackburn? I cannot see us winning. So I'm going to say, or scoring frankly, 2-0 to Blackburn, sorry.
01:07:27
Speaker
Okay. I mean, it's, it's, it's as six-pointery a promotion game as you can kind of get because we are, you know, we are literally then one point off sixth place if we win it. Um, punt, so you say we're going to draw punt, sorry, lose, punt.
01:07:42
Speaker
So, well, this is from a man who thought we were going to draw with Sheffield United, but I really, for some unknown reason, I really fancy us against Blackburn because I've seen nothing of them to have any kind of fear about this season, even though they've beaten us twice. Marceline Nunez is going to rise from the treatment table, play in a number 10, feed Pookie, and we are going to win 3-1. And then we'll fuck up after that.
01:08:12
Speaker
But you know, look, it's very Norwich, very on brand Norwich to just go, right, we'll give you a little bit of hope again, and then we'll take it away from you. Well, they lost to Birmingham and they lost to Stoke, who I thought were abysmal. And so on that basis, I think we are going to win 3-1.
01:08:43
Speaker
Pookie, two goals and I feel like a win with Pookie scored. There are three more seasons from Timu. He'll make the 100. I feel like a win with a... This is potentially the most... I'm glad we came out in a positive way, mate. Well done. This is one of the most unbalanced we've ever been in terms of Jekyll and Hyde.
01:08:54
Speaker
and have to do another one on the podcast where we go, what is this team?
01:09:14
Speaker
let me let me hypothesize that a win with a pookie brace could be such an unbelievable catalyst for the running because if we fix if we fix the feeling that actually we've got the weapon that we know we've got in pookie
01:09:32
Speaker
And he scores two, one, one's not enough. One and one and some really, really good chances for Pukey specifically that's only because of the brilliant goalkeeping that stopped him doing it. That would count as well. But two goals for Pukey and a win to move us to one point behind them.
01:09:49
Speaker
Then it's back on lads. Then it's back onto. Then I'm starting to pull up at the view from my seat. View from my seat from Wembley to start putting our route there. And we go, yeah, we could definitely, we definitely want to finish fifth though, because I fancy it's more on its loop than well. We can do it. Right. On to good Friday. It's going to be a great Friday. We're going to win. Pookie's going to start scoring again. On the ball city. Mind out you go.