I agree with you on some things there 1950, but not others. I agree Turner looked pretty poor to begin with, and I did see fans seriously questioning why he was brought in. The fact Barnett was preferred to him for a few games early on tells it's own story. And yep, early on we weren't playing that well, although I think this is partially as the squad (with a lot of new faces) hadn't gelled at that point. I also agree that a long-term injury to Bassong could have had a huge impact on our season. For this reason I think we need another strong CB this summer, to take the load off him a bit. Being able to rotate Bassong, Turner and the new signing would be handy. However, with 3 points from 7 games, even with form that bad we weren't going to be challenging Derby, we were practically halfway there already!
I also agree that Turner was poor to begin with, but I still backed him. A lot of new players when moving t new clubs take time to settle in but end up being great, as Turner did. Plenty of players also change clubs and settle in straight away.
Carla - there was an infamous letter to the EDP on behalf of a group of supporters suggesting that Turner was the worst player to wear a City shirt since Charlie Billington in the 1950's. This letter caused considerable debate on this forum at the time. DH - In fairness I did say that at one time ' I feared we would CHALLENGE Derby ' I can only repeat again that I feel Hughton has done an excellent job but IMO the stats and my eyes do not suggest that we have made progress on last year.
1950, you keep mentioning the word 'progress'. can i just ask what progress you were expecting this season, as you seem to have much higher expectations than the vast majority on here. for me, and i'm sure nearly everyone else, we were realistic enough to know that after the disruption caused by lambert leaving, combined with an 'iffy' last 12 games or so last term, that this season was always going to be about survival and nothing else. it looks for all the world as though we are going to achieve that so what's the problem? did anyone genuinely feel we would better last seasons performance? fact is, we actually might do! that's why i find the word 'progress' completely useless when talking about this season because a) we still have ten games left and could better last season and b) our expectations were lowered to that of mere survival as it was a new manager. i just don't understand the moaning about what the club is achieving this season. the manager is doing everything right in taking the club to a better and more stable place.
oh, and this 'letter' to the edp - i've never seen it but if its true, it was clearly written by total idiots. anyone could see turner is a good defender - he just had a difficult start as every mistake he made got punished. why would anyone over react like that?
This seems to have turned upside down!!! I was not expecting progress this year - as I have said I was expecting disaster which has not happened because of the efforts of Hughton. I was just arguing against those suggesting progress had been made. Yes Bassong and Turner are an improvement but would Whitbread and Bennett have looked better with Johnson and Tettey in front of them? If you look through the forum you will see the lengthy debate generated by that letter and the fact that nobody agreed with the letter writer.
But surely 1950 if you were expecting disaster and we are doing OK and you accept that we have better players now than last season then we are by your own definition making progress? You have a point that it is easier to defend behind two DM's than one holding player but I think that our two first choice CH's are better than any of those available to PL last year.
The EDP is an awful player. Also, as I said above, Turner just needed to settle in. He was also being picked on for mistakes he made more so than Bassong. Admittedly two of those mistakes led to us conceding goals. But this 'love' for Bassong and 'hate' for Turner has had an unfortunate impact on people's views on the two players. Bassong seems to get away with mistakes than Turner does even though the mistakes may be as bad as each other.
Also these people who wrote this letter about Turner are stupid. You can't call a player the worst player to play for Norwich based on 3 or 4 games.
I think it's fair to say they can't have been supporting Norwich long, and clearly missed the side(s) that saw us slide down the championship. Brellier anyone?
We played a big part of last season with our prefered centre backs injured, Whitbread and Ayala both in the same game I seem to remember. Also when we played Newcastle at home I think we only had 1 fit centre back. People are saying that 'stats' don't matter and we shouldn't read anything into them, but all of you are quoting 'stats' back? Anyway my post is not necessarily about stats, it's a fact... we're conceded more goals this season so far than we did last.
Turner was man of the match by far today Of course our defense is tonnes better than Lambos to argue otherwise is crazy
As I said earlier, try putting last years defence in place of this years defence. We would be in a FAR FAR worse position!
