Match Day Thread Norwich city v Watford Tuesday 18:00

I guess it's subjective but if that's the sort of football you like to watch week in week out then that's great .

I would argue that Norwich's free flowing attacking style is easier on the eye and probably less effective in the Premier League but I wouldn't swap anything about my club, our owners , our coach ,our style or our league position with Watford's.

We aren't just another soulless foreign owned franchise and haven't spent anywhere near the amount Watford have , your hire and fire approach to managers is not anything to be proud of either but whatever floats your boat.

 

Thanks for an answer worthy of Johnson's attempts to avoid answering questions that he doesn't like or has difficulty remembering the facts.
I wouldn't swap any of our last 4 results against your butterflies either. Your 'easier on the eye' football has produced 66 goals. WFC's style has produced 60.
However, if you thought that last night Norwich played the football, and WFC tried to stop them , then I'm afraid you are somewhat deluded. Apart from playing neater ,swifter, CLEANER (judging by the stats) more threatening football for the majority of the game , WFC had 18 shots to your 12, 5 on target to your 2, and 13 corners to your 5.
Well, good luck next season ,you are going to need it more than WFC.
Finally, before spraying insults around, try looking up on some facts. The owner of WFC and his family has been involved in football since 1986. (10 years longer than your current majority shareholders). The owner of WFC is resident in the UK , and is independent of the family's other football interests.
We have had 21 manager head/coaches since 1992 ( 2 changes due to ill health). Norwich have had 19. So either we are not hire and fire merchants, or Norwich are too. It's a stupid insult to attempt. I'm not in favour of trigger-happy owners, and certainly WFC have made some bizarre decisions in that regard, but the decision -making at WFC is different. You might not like it, ( but who cares what you think about WFC's decision-making) but both our clubs have recovered from losing Premier league status in some style , albeit by (in WFC's case) necessary changes.
Last summer Norwich had a net spend of - £31.6m ( i.e. received that amount more than they spent). WFC had a net spend of - £42.75m . Oh look, it's less than Norwich.

 

OK thanks for sharing that rant but this is a dedicated thread for Norwich fans and although views and input from other boards is welcome and appreciated.

I'm not particularly interested and in my opinion we have witnessed a magnificent season and already sewn up promotion and the trophy would just be the cherry on top of the cake but irrelevant in the big scheme of things .

My personal opinion that Watford are a side that plays ugly football and you are just another soulless franchise will not change so I'm not sure what you want me to say .

Good luck in your final 3 games and if you go up then see you next season .

Other than that I'm not particularly interested.
You come across as very sensitive about criticism, you have your 6 points from us so I don't know why you are getting yourself wound up.

Take care buddy

 

You do know you won? Relax it's fine. Norwichs current style of football might not be best suited to surviving the PL, but it's really nice to watch when it clicks. And let's not forget that thats the point of supporting a team no? To watch them. And enjoy doing so.

You keep doing your thing we will keep doing ours. Coming over to our board and ranting and saying who cares what you think about Watford is a strange play, as your committed presence here betrays that you clearly care.

Not sure what youre talking about suggesting we are in no position to point out Watfords high turnover of managers though. In the last 10 years you've got through 13 fully appointed managers.(excluding OGJ and McKinley) We have had 5. I can't see any similarities between our clubs there.

 

Thanks for a rational , reasonable reply. I wouldn't have bothered at all, but for some unnecessary moaning on our thread. I like to read other fans views of games, and it's interesting how 2 fans from opposite sides see a given game completely differently.
I completely agree about enjoying it when it clicks. We were awful at Luton (of all places!) and I was very dejected, but at half time yesterday, I would have been disappointed but content if we'd drawn, ( not if we'd lost !) as the play was so much better. It was good to watch and NCFC's football was neat and clever in patches. My whole reason for getting involved on your thread was the rather whingeing intrusion on ours , which I felt needed a response, acceptable I hoped.
I think we play a decent brand of football, which is exciting and effective, especially as for this season we haven't had a genuine effective goalscorer for a lot of the time ( perhaps recruitment didn't work so well there, but let's not dwell on Hugill either) , so we have had to adapt. The goals ( 60 compared to your 66) have come from all over the place. Much more fun !
The point about managers is interesting. It is bewildering to most WFC fans. However, our 'model' is different. We have a head coach , who operates in a far more limited way than the 'manager/supremo' model still common in England. Thus we can change the head coach ( and his team) without rocking the while boat. Whilst it's true we've made some odd choices, and a few grievous errors ( Pearson being the most obvious, although he has a few skeletons) - which club cannot say that. Clearly the last change has been entirely beneficial.
I think NCFC have had a really good season , and hope we both survive , and go on to be a solid fixture up there, tough though it is. But I won't let ill-informed, ignorant, inaccurate slurs on our club, style of play, ownership or management pass without some form of reply to address the issues. To say we play ugly football is just plain stupid , and isn't remotely justifiable.

 

Fair enough. I think you've struck a better and more measured tone here. Enjoy the rest of the season and we will meet again in the top tier. When we next play we will do our best to stay off the booze the weekend before!

 

I confess to not knowing much about Pozzo the Watford owner but I seem to remember he and Udinese were entangled in a match fixing scandal or something and they were deducted points.

Can't remember the full details but he has a whiff of dodgy Italian about him, I certainly wouldn't want someone like that buying Norwich as part of a business portfolio with other sporting club franchises .

Each to their own though .

 

Yes it was a dodgy phone call to Lazio just before Udinese played in 1990 that was seen as match-fixing.

There's no doubting that the Pozzo model (scout lots of cheap high risk high reward players - play them to advertise them - get team into top division to better advertise your wares - sell them on for profit) has worked very well for them at Udinese. But the moment you own multiple clubs some are going to get given priority. Udinese are in sorry decline now and have a fraction of the quality they used to in their squad. Watford are the favoured child now due to the riches of the premier league.

And thats the difference really. Watford are part of a very successful business operation. The goal of the Pozzos is not driven by a love of Watford. Just as they have shown that they have no love of Udinese. It's business, and the high turnover of coaches and squads is an integral part of that strategy.

For the stick she gets, when Delia was approached to buy the majority stake, it was because she was a fan already. She didn't um and ah and go and look at Crystal Palace to see if buying them would be a better business move. She bought in to Norwich with her money because she'd long ago bought in with her heart. And as the recent ESL revolt has shown, without that connection in ownership, clubs lose something vital.

 

Dear me, can't you give it a rest. Udinese was implicated in a scandal just after the Pozzo family acquired them. They were relegated, suffered a points deduction. and G Pozzo suffered another penalty after (flimsy) evidence based on a telephone call. The owner of Watford ( not this G Pozzo) joined the club (Udinese) 3 years later. G Pozzo retained his ownership , but not control, of Udinese until 2008. At least they stuck with the club whatever was thrown at them.
Sadly, your comments smell of xenophobia. I have heard it said it's quite prevalent in Norfolk, but that might just be Ipswich Town supporters hinting at inbreeding. I wouldn't know, and as such won't comment, and neither, I suggest , should you.

I agree - it needed a reasonable intermediary to stop me getting even more cross ( the above notwithstanding. Can't you have a word ?)
At least we don't have to apologise for supporting the snouts in the trough displayed before us this week.
I'm not sure staying off the booze will help ,unless your lot always go on the p*ss before they play us.

 

Not sure how criticising dodgy crooks implicated in match fixing is Xenophobia, what a strange comment.

 

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Ok I think it's time for you to head on back to your own board wherever that is. You're not entering into sensible conversation any more.

DD isn't xenophobic to say the Pozzos were involved in a match-fixing scandal. Gino's father was. And was banned for control of the club due to it. Possibly why his son came in. And to say Italian football has had corruption and dodgy dealings is factually true.

You have beaten us twice this year so well done. But seeing as you were so keen to point out the match stats of our most recent game to show how much better you were in all areas, I suggest you repeat the exercise for the previous fixture instead. You"ll find that the only two metrics you did 'better' than us were goals scored and fouls committed.

But yes time for you to go now.

 

Pretty sure Watford's ex chairman Riva was charged with money laundering too.

Lot's of funny goings on .

https://www.chicagotribune.com/90mi...-in-money-laundering-case-20180216-story.html

 

And fraud

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/footbal...orging-banking-letter-ingino-pozzos-takeover/

 

I just read that. He's banned from English football indefinitely.

This is the trouble with dreaming of a big money take over sadly. Some dodgy and unscrupulous people seem to be keen to get in on the game. I guess when there's potentially so much money to be made its inevitable.

 

Its something I really like about supporting Norwich to be honest. As a club we really haven't been in any way morally comprised to get the (sporadic) success we've had for the last 10 years. No mental gymnastics needed.

In my acting days I toured a production of Animal Farm around Italy for 6 months, visiting 40 or so different towns and cities. The overwhelming message from the young Italians working with me was that Italy was super corrupt, to the point of most young Italians wanting to leave to have a fair chance elsewhere. Hell, one guy was employed to tour with us with a big envelope of euros and just pay bribes and shakedowns whereever we went to ease the process. Only other country I've seen corruption so open was Kenya and even then it wasn't so brazen and 'institutionalised'. So yeah, long story short - saying Italy has a lot of.corruption is a factually supported statement.


Edit - I don't mind the inbreeding comments really, but it's just so juvenile. I teach kids already, I don't need to entertain them on the internet as well.

 

So head to head over the 2 games

Shots

Watford 30 6 on target

Norwich 30 5 on target

Fouls

Watford 29

Norwich 21

 

After 42 games total fouls committed

Norwich 450

Watford 581

Norwich have committed the least fouls and Watford the second most after Birmingham.


Norwich are the 4th most fouled team 586


Total shots

Norwich 670

Watford 495

Goals scored

Norwich 66

Watford 60

Goals conceded

Norwich 32

Watford 28



http://www.footstats.co.uk/index.cfm?task=league_fouls

 

Norwich are statistically the least dirty in the league and Watford the second dirtiest.

With Watford committing 131 more fouls over the season after 42 games , so to brand them a physical team that win ugly is not Ignorance they are also more clinical.


One for the stats thread