Hard, I know. 1) We have nothing to lose now. We can play our last two matches without fear. It is out of our hands. 2) The other three teams are putting each other under a lot of pressure. Bournemouth can afford one draw and still be sure of promotion. The others can't. If they're drawing or even losing at half time in any of their games, the pressure will be huge. 3) We can go above Boro if they don't win both games. These look easy - hapless Fulham and a Brighton who have stopped scoring goals (well done, Chris) - but Boro are much better at doing what they did last night than they are going for goal. They don't score that many. 4) Watford have a shaky defence. Again their games look easy but they might concede and put themselves under pressure. 5) When AN took over, we would all have been ecstatic to be in this position with two games to go (an outside chance of automatic promotion).
Totally agree SC and if someone had offered us the chance to be in this position in the middle of January, I'm positive nearly every fan would have 'snapped their hand off'. I've just looked at the match stats on the BBC website and we'd 69% of the play, 20 shots on goal (2 on target - but I would have said more, as at least one was cleared off the line!!!) and we were denied a pretty clear penalty in the 2nd half. Boro's storming start was eventually what cost us the match, but Bamford had a wonderful opportunity to make it 2-0 when 1on1 with Ruddy after about 80 minutes!! I would have liked to go up via the autos and avoid the lottery of the playoffs, but that now seems unlikely and I was always planning on keeping May 25rh free for a day out at Wembley. At the end of the day, other than the loss of the megabucks we'd suffer by not getting promotion, I wouldn't be too aggrieved by another season in the Championship and as long as we can retain most of our players, we would stand an excellent chance of winning the title next year. I fear Ruddy, Redmond and Johnson may all leave and I sincerely hope that AN is still be our manager!!!
For me it was typical Norwich, we choked at the start of the game when the pressure was on. I fear now the same will happen in the playoffs.? AN needs to thin this squad out of fringe prem players and assemble a team of fighters from the best the champ has to offer. Jerome typified this with his falling about, Ruddy again felt the pressure nearly spilling into his net again. Whits is better going forward than defending, Martin just looks slow and I've still seen nothing yet to say I'd want us to spend £5m on Dorrens in the summer! It's time to plan for next seasons assault with Alex Neil.
Interesting comments chippy. I was hoping we'd see a slight tinkering with the starting 11, especially with 3 games in 7 days!!! Why doesn't Ofoe get a chance to see what he can add to the team?? We have some potentially excellent players out on loan, so let's get them back and see if they can be developed in the close season, or let them go and try and buy replacements.
I agree with point 1 SC, and perhaps we'll hammer 6-8 goals in during the next 2 games, putting the pressure further on those around us. I think we did choke a bit as Boro took the game to us and we could not contain Bamford around the back - Whittaker was done a couple of times and easily. Bamford's injury was a let off. Will be interesting to see the table this eve! OTBC
Well now is not the time to be experimenting with new line-ups and formations. Having won five in a row it was only logical that we put out the same team that had been so successful. I was in the Wensum corner last night and I have to say as irritated as I was by Boro's time-wasting and defensive mindset that they really were very impressive. They were very organised, pressed effectively and won nearly every header. Even though they allowed us lots of possession they never really looked nervous. I would be very surprised if they drop any points. I think the most likely team to drop points is Bournemouth, but they can afford to slip up once. All of the remaining games for the teams in the top four are against similar teams so I'm afraid to say that the most logical place for us to finish now is fourth which I believe will be a play-off against Derby County? We could lose both our remaining games and that position wouldn't change am I right? We can do nothing but hope that other teams slip up but it is really out of our hands thus we should be getting ready for the play-offs. So maybe when I said now is not the time to be experimenting, maybe I was wrong. Since Boro have now done the double on us, maybe we should use our final two games to try and work out a strategy to beat them at Wembley?
I know it's ifs and buts, but howson should have scored with a header in the first half- at least I think he should from where I was sitting and the game could have been very different - yes boro were very well organised but if our passing had been slightly sharper (as it has been ) then we would be sitting on top-
A quote from twitter last night: Steve Downes @stevedownes1973 January = would have been grateful for play-offs. April = disappointed to be in play-offs (probably). #ncfc have come a long way.
To be honest, I thought it likely that Watford would overtake us on goal difference or even goals scored anyway even if we'd kept on winning, leading to really painful last day of the season. This way, the squad (& supporters) has time to mentally adjust to the play-offs and plan for them. (Not that I'm giving up hope of a miracle but just being realistic!) Planning for them could mean avoiding injury/burn-out to key players through team selection & subs. I'd fancy our chances against any of the prospective play-off teams, including Middlesbrough actually, so I still think we've got a great chance of going up.
Its best to lose a game now and regroup as we have time to get our heads straight for a final push, imagine how deflated we would be to do this on the last day of the season and finish 3rd , the pressure is completely off us now and there is still time for positions to change again we just have to focus on our own game plan. AN has had his first taste of boro now and will know a lot more the next time we play them, hopefully we wont have to. Point no. 5 sums it up for me, this has been one of the most exciting end of season finishes for a few years and im actually quite looking forward to the playoffs if we have to go that route, what ever happens this season we will still have one of the best up and coming managers next season what ever league we are in.
This was a scenario that crossed my mind, and painful though yesterday was, I think AN will have a plan B for this very situation. I am still grateful that we are in a position to go up, and not sitting around 12th, like an unwanted slightly deflated wrinkled old party balloon, forgotten in the corner of the room. We still have a lot of air left in us. OTBC
totally agree and you beat me to it Infact i think our chances of beating teams like boro greater away from carrow road, we really need to learn how to sit back a bit, creat more space to move forward into, we dont usually have this problem playing away from home and im sure AN has a plan to address this..
Absolutely. We're very fortunate to have AN, and he'll get the squad in the right frame of mind to do the business.
I also agree with Ware and we should now prepare for the play-offs by playing attacking football involving Hooper, Redmond and Odjidja-Ofoe in our last two games.
If we fall short and have to try through the play offs we have doubled Ipswich and Watford without conceding so would be happy to play them again
If we don't go up (and I still think we will), life in the Championship is far more exciting than Premiership anyway. You just need to look at the top 8 scrap this season.
absolutly gutted driving back to kent last night after the game. thought we would get at least a draw,and fancied us to win,but did not expect to loose last night. thought AN left it a bit late with the changes,and for me tetty loooked shattered,and i thought bradley johnstone should have stayedon,but i dont want to bitch about the guy he has done so well for us.we should have scored,of course,and if we did would have gone on to win,i am sure.we must get our heads around being in the play offs now,and i am confident we can beat any of those we are likley to meet,it is shaping up for us to play the binners at wembley!
I had hoped AN might make a couple of changes to teh starting 11, but as you say, we don't want to criticise him!! Must admit, I was pretty subdued coming home on the bus last night, but now accept that if we're to go up this season, it will have be through the play offs. My only concern is that Derby seem to getting back to the form that took them to the top of the league.
