Norwich finished 10 points ahead of the playoff spots in the Championship last season — if anyone has a right to be here, they do. More importantly, Norwich did try to bridge the gap this summer. They lost their chief creator in Emi Buendia, presumably on a promise that he could leave having stayed at the club for their Championship promotion season.
They regularly face teams whose financial strength dwarfs anything that Norwich could ever hope to aspire to as a provincial club in a comparatively unfashionable in football terms at least area of the country. They have seen salary demands for potential signings increase rapidly as the Premier League got richer and are not prepared to risk the financial future of the club.
It is only 12 years since Norwich were close to calling in the administrators. Just as unsavoury was their domination of the Championship last season after taking 21 points in the Premier League the year before.
We can accept a team being relegated without trace; focus simply shifts to more competitive battles in the Premier League table. What grated was the ease in which they were able to return. In addition to that, relegated Premier League clubs receive parachute payments that aim to act as a financial buffer to account for the substantial drop in broadcasting revenue.
There are good reasons for those payments, but all surround Premier League incentivisation. Essentially, without them a club would be heavily guarded against spending after promotion because instant relegation would leave them with a high commitment of expenditure without the guaranteed income. The Premier League would therefore fear the same three clubs coming down every season except in the case of severe mismanagement from an existing Premier League club. Incredibly, there were just two goals in the first five matches held at the venue, with neither being scored by the home side.
It would not be until their sixth game that Norwich broke their duck at The Nest in a draw with Bristol Rovers, before securing their first win there a fortnight later with a victory over Reading. They would be less goal-shy in , when the Club produced a record league win by thrashing Coventry City in Division Three South. Between the s and s two notable individual records were set, with Ron Ashman accumulating a club-high total of appearances between and while Johnny Gavin set the current record for most goals scored by striking times in games across two spells from to City lifted their first major trophy in when they won the League Cup by defeating Rochdale United over two legs; being captained by the iconic Ashman in both matches.
A year later, a record-high attendance was set as 43, spectators packed into Carrow Road to watch Norwich take on Leicester City in the FA Cup sixth round. They would go one better in , when they won the competition for a second time courtesy of a victory over Sunderland which was decided by an own goal from Black Cats defender Gordon Chisholm. Their route to the final itself was a challenging one, having trailed to East Anglian rivals Ipswich Town following the first leg of the semi-final at Portman Road.
City would have been set for their first season in Europe off the back of their League Cup success, but on May 31, , all English clubs were banned from continental competition indefinitely as a result of the Heysel Stadium disaster two days earlier. It is there where the Canaries enjoyed perhaps their finest moment, as they stunned the footballing world by becoming the first British side in history to defeat German giants Bayern Munich at the Olympic Stadium.
By comparison, Norwich managed 5. Pukki has looked a shadow of his former self without the Argentinian. Admittedly, the Finnish striker returned a positive Covid test after Euro , which affected his pre-season and held him back from developing partnerships with his many new teammates.
The hope must be that the quality of the new arrivals, combined with the players who picked up another year of experience while winning the Championship, will be enough to keep Norwich up. We are only five games into the new season and Norwich will be a far more intimidating opponent once the new signings gel, but the defeat to Watford should be a wake-up call.
Norwich won the Championship in before finishing last in the Premier League in the season, ending the campaign with 10 straight defeats. Farke does not appear to have learned from previous mistakes made at this level. If the opening weeks of the season are an indication of what is to come for Norwich, it could be another long campaign for the club.
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