Bristol City And Norwich City - Similar?

[Andy082005]

Been chatting in work this morning with a colleague and we were discussing a Norwich fan on TalkSport yesterday. He was asked by Alan Brazil what has changed in recent years to turn Norwich around.

The caller bascially said for to many years, Norwich were a soft touch and an easy ride. He said they were to much of a "nice" club. He commented about Bryan Gunn being a really nice bloke, but was to nice to be manager, and should never have been given the managers job in the first place,

He explained that the chairman changed things by becoming more ruthless. He said eyebrows were raised by many outside the club when he binned off Gunn after one game of the new season, but he got in a manager who wasnt afraid to shake things up. He said both the chairman and the manager have been ruthless when needed, and really turned the club from a mediocre, soft touch of a club where people get an easy ride.....into a confident, thriving club.

This situation reminds me very much of our own. I dont just mean with the Millen situation as manager, I also mean with our back room staff and to a certain degree, players. Louis Carey is a prime example. He will be given a new contract this summer, in a time when were losing money hand over fist. A new contract to one of our oldest players who has clearly lost a yard of pace, and now has a hearing problem. It may sound harsh, but there is no room for sentiments in football. Louis has been an excellent player for this club, but his time is up, and the fact we are prepared to give the lad a new contract to me, is a poor decision. Just like when GJ gave Scott murray another contract.

With regards the coaching staff, ive said before on here I believe their are staff who have ran out ideas. The sheer amount of players who come here (or come through the youth set up), then dont progress, kind of says it all really.

I know some people will say Norwich are a bigger club then us, however to my knowledge, they have not spent a boat load of money on players in recent. I just found it interesting and thought our situations were very similar.

Thoughts?

[Monkeh]

completely agree with this

[EmersonsKev]

I'm in agreement. The old man and I had a very similar conversation on monday about the whole city of Bristol being a soft touch not just the team.

['Orns]

Norwich are a bigger club than us, no doubt about it, but one we should be looking to copy. Lambert has done a terrific job there, very envious!

[Ison]

I agree wholeheartedly with this sentiment. I've said it before and I'll say it again - we're far too nice for our own good. I think we'll stick with Millen for the foreseeable future, but I'd like to see us go for a few more players with a similar mentality to Paul Hartley.

[Monkeh]

I agree wholeheartedly with this sentiment. I've said it before and I'll say it again - we're far too nice for our own good. I think we'll stick with Millen for the foreseeable future, but I'd like to see us go for a few more players with a similar mentality to Paul Hartley.

Well if Millen can show a ruthless side (he can start by not offering Carey a contract) and start re-building replacing coaching staff etc he will be going in the right direction in my eyes,

But as I fear he won't be like that and be nice offering contracts to Carey McAllister and the same coaching staff for years to come and we will be stuck fighting relegation/lower mid table for the next 5 years

[Red Exile]

I agree with you Andy. Interesting that when we came up to the Championship it looked briefly as though we'd be in a position to emulate the clubs I've always seen as models which City might follow...Norwich, Ipswich, Southampton...clubs which have, in the main, been well run and lived within their means...until recent times. In fact we were doing better than them for a bit.

They all have better records of success and consequently bigger active fan bases but I would guess there aren't many more armchair Norwich fans than there are Bristol City...they're just better at getting people through the gate. And Norwich City are at the heart of their local and business community...which we don't seem to be.

The difference between Millen and Lambert isn't just their personality...and we can't know much about what goes on in the dressing room. Paul Lambert had already proved he could be a successful manager...a winner.

[Keith_Lemon]

I don't think Norwich are anything spectacular. There just carrying on their great form from their promotion season ( As We Did). If Norwich fail for promotion your see a big difference next season. I still believe Paul Lambert is an ok manager, nothing brilliant about him in my opinion (similar to GJ I believe). The same goes for Leeds, their riding their promotion form from last season but have took the foot of the pedal. Though I do like Simon Grayson.

[chipdawg]

I think there's a fair bit in what the OP say's- we definitely need to be more ruthless in the summer with regard to transfers in and out of the club. I suspect this is one of the reasons that steve lansdown is taking a back seat, he's been too close to staff in the past and not been objective enough.

However, do you not see the similarities between norwich now and us in our play off season? Do you not think people looked enviously at bristol city that season and speculated as to why we'd been successful? The only difference is that they've spent a bit more money than we did and took advantage of their success to bring in loan players like lansbury. People should also remember that paul lambert's managerial career up to joining norwich was getting sacked by wycombe and half a season at colchester and many canaries fans felt it was a knee-jerk reaction to one result

Its all very well comparing us to other clubs but you also need a healthy slice of luck to do well

[Chappers]

City seem to be a Club with a self-destruct tendency, we seem to move forward, have a grandiose ambition, raise expectations unrealistically, spend money very badly, then collapse due to over-spending and lack of any coherent long-term planning. City are not a big Club in the Championship, and one look at our current squad will tell you just how much money we have wasted in buying pretty ordinary players, and how little we have invested in developing players. It's not sustainable, we need to be much better at developing players, be willing to invest in players with potential, use the loan system (As we finally are), and have a smaller squad of experienced pros, focussed on quality rather than quantity.

Problem is that we have been wasting money for a number of years, and it will take a few years to gat rid of the players who do not offer value, and our Academy was so badly neglected by GJ that it will take a few years before we see any benefits, or longer if the Manager keeps ignoring players in favour of half-fit 35 year olds! It might just be a case of getting through the next couple of years, aiming to survive but with an eye on the future, then start moving forward when (if) we are in our new ground.