Quick Catch Up...

 Oh hi there!
It's been a little while since the blog was last updated. When I last checked in Daniel Farke was just steering us to relegation for the first time. A few little things have happened since then...I'll cover some of that another time. Today I just wanted to look forward to the season ahead and briefly look at where the club is.

THE PLAN
To compete for promotion as long as possible throughout the season. With the money we have spent, you would expect us to be competitive however it doesn't always work out like that. Will the players gel quickly enough? Will the manager implement his ideas? Will key players remain fit all season? I think the majority of the fanbase would accept us at least trying to get promoted as progress on last year.

LESSONS LEARNT FROM LAST YEAR
Urgh. Last year feels like a huge missed opportunity. The league was pretty open and a little run could propel a team up the table in a few weeks. That Norwich had a manager who set his standards so low was deeply frustrating to watch. The squad had potential to really fight for it, but the restrictive formation and playing style neutered that. Nobody goes to Carrow Road to watch Shane Duffy dominate possession along the back line. 

THE MOOD
Tempered excitement about the possibilities. I suspect a quiet start to the season might be more likely than a barnstorming battle charge but once we have found our rhythm I think we might put on more of a show than last season. I do worry that some sections of the support are looking at our new signings and forgetting that only 1 of them played Championship football last year so a lot of adjusting will have to take place very quickly for them to fly from the get-go.

ONE TO WATCH
Vladan Kovacevic, our new goalkeeper. I seems to have the potential to be a bit of a maverick.

MOST LIKELY TO...
Make the play-off semi finals

LEAST LIKELY TO...
To have quiet uneventful derby days.

THE BIG TALKING POINT IS...
Starting a season with owners equipped to financially back the club in the transfer market. It's unfamiliar ground to Norwich fans and we're all hoping the choices of signings work out and the owners continue to invest.

OUR KEY PLAYER WILL BE...
Sarge if he stays, or Crnac who seems to have spent his summer working hard and is looking much more competitive on the pitch.

THE PANTOMIME VILLAIN WILL BE...
Anybody in a blue and white shirt.

THE ACTIVE PLAYER I'D LOVE TO HAVE BACK IS...
Emi Buendia or Gabriel Sara, both could fine that perfect pass.

THE ONE CHANGE I'D MAKE WOULD BE...
Norwich have a Hall of Fame that last had inductees about fifteen years ago. Teemu Pukki not being in the Norwich City Hall of Fame is criminal.

THE NEW KIT IS...
The Home Shirt is great, although a little too similar to the 94-96 kit personally. The Away Shirt is fine and the Third Shirt seems to be very very popular.

FANS THINK OUR GAFFER IS...
A new and exciting appointment.

They say it's the hope that kills you, but for Norwich City this is a genuinely pivotal year.
COME ON CITY!!

Best & Worst: Norwich City FC

XI
BEST:
BRYAN GUNN,
RUSSELL MARTIN,
CRAIG FLEMING,
MALKY MACKAY,
ADAM DRURY,
DARREN EADIE,
BRADLEY JOHNSON,
WES HOOLAHAN,
DARREN HUCKERBY,
TEEMU PUKKI,
GRANT HOLT
WORST:
MICHAEL THEOKLITOS,
JURGEN COLIN,
STEVE WALSH,
MARCEL FRANKE,
FERNANDO DERVELD, 
BEN MARSHALL,
VADIS ODIDJA-OFOE,
STEVEN NAISMITH,
YANIC WILDSCHUT,
RICKY VAN WOLFSWINKEL,
KYLE LAFFERTY

PLAYER
BEST: WES HOOLAHAN. He got us promoted 3 times in his 10 years and danced rings around defenders in whatever league he was in. 
WORST: MICHAEL THEOKLITOS. On his debut for the club he conceded 7 goals against Colchester United in League One. Grant Holt says that as "Theo" was walking out the stadium that day his catching was so bad that he even dropped and smashed his iPhone.

MOMENT
BEST: NATHAN REDMOND SCORING THE SECOND GOAL IN THE PLAY-OFF FINAL. The goal that really calmed everyones nerves and reassured us that it was going to be a worthwhile trip.
WORST: RELEGATION TO LEAGUE ONE. Losing 4-2 to an already relegated Charlton side who dragged us down with them. Awful.

GAME
BEST: NORWICH CITY 3 MANCHESTER CITY 2. David v Golliath. We had an incredible injury list that meant we were playing anyone with a spare yellow shirt and somehow managed to beat the kabillionaires. The atmosphere was amazing. The rest of the season was a steady decline from that point, but still!
WORST: NORWICH CITY 1 COLCHESTER UNITED 7. Urgh

SEASON
BEST: CHAMPIONS IN 2019/20. Now this is a mildly controversial decision. There's no disputing it was out highest ever points total however the empty stadium due to covid means some might feel it didn't compare to rabble rousing title wins of the past, and I can see their point but it's my list so my decision is final.
WORST: RELEGATION TO LEAGUE ONE. Glenn Roeder tore the club apart through sheer arrogance and short-sighted spite. He brought the club to its knees, thank goodness for Paul Lambert and David McNally.

SIGNING
BEST: TEEMU PUKKI. Lets not forget that he was a free transfer. The man scores goals virtually every other game, a true legend.
WORST: YANIC WILDSCHUTT. We signed him from Wigan for a considerable fee and then immediately played him against his former club and you could see the confidence hammered out of him as their fans abused him from start to finish. Never improved after that.

MANAGER
BEST: DANIEL FARKE. You can't argue with what he achieved and the revenue he has helped bring into the club. Promoted while producing players to help keep the club afloat. Paul Lambert pushed him close but his star has shone a little less brightly since he left for some reason or other.
WORST: GLENN ROEDER. Literally the only good thing he did was sign Wes Hoolahan, even then he played him as a winger, which was never going to play to his strengths. 

GOAL
BEST: JEREMY GOSS VS BAYERN MUNICH. You didn't think I was going to NOT mention that game did you?
WORST: ROBERT ULLATHORNE'S OWN GOAL AGAINST IPSWICH. The infamous bobble that bamboozled Bryan Gunn as the ball bounced over his foot and into the goal. It still stings.

FACIAL HAIR
BEST: GRANT HOLT'S 'TACHE. He only had it for Movember but if you score 3 against Ipswich with it, then it becomes legendary.
WORST: LEWIS GRABBAN'S WISPY CHIN HAIRS. Not quite a beard.

HARD MAN
BEST: GARY HOLT. Ginger, Scottish and tenacious as ****. 3 Lungs was not a man to mess with.
WORST: JULIAN BRELLIER. Arrived with the nickname "The Judge", but was more of a clerk. Just a bit rubbish.

GOAL CELEBRATION
BEST: ROBERT EARNSHAW Somersaults will always trump pretty much any other celebration.
WORST: MARCO STIEPERMANN The crab celebration was awful, but I loved it. 

Premier In...and back out again.

The 2018-19 season was ridiculous. It made no sense at all really. How could a ragtag bunch of misfits from across Europe combine so successfully with a handful of promising young British talent and find themselves as champions of their division and plying their trade in the "best league in the world"? It was a testament to the values of hard work, shrewd recruitment, encouraging management and also a fair helping of good luck. Marco Stiepermann stepped up from being the left-back cover to being an effective centre forward. I felt that Jordan Rhodes loan move was intended for him to be the star striker and for Teemu Pukki to understudy. Why swap Sheffield Wednesday's bench for ours otherwise? Pukki's form surprised everyone and kept Rhodes on the periphery. 

The season was largely injury-free for the squad and meant that Farke's only real selection headache was keeping those on the sidelines happy while they waited for their chance. The fans had well and truly bought into the project and roared the team on both home and away, truly becoming a 12th man on the pitch. All these factors gave us all optimism for the Premier League campaign. We'd stayed up in the past with squads less promising than this one. I truly believed we were set for a barnstorming season and could gatecrash the top half with a prevailing wind in our favour. Unfortunately, the weather has been mostly stormy typhoons and we find ourselves shipwrecked back where we started. 

We could have fared well in the 2019-2020 season if one or two of the elements behind our success had dimmed, but luck was well and truly against us. We won friends after our second half performance against Liverpool on the opening day, we then beat Newcastle at home in our next match after a Teemu Pukki hat-trick but then Chelsea narrowly beat us 3-2 and Crawley Town knocked us out the FA Cup. Immediately injuries began to stack up in comically large numbers. We resorted to a midfielder in defence and two goalkeepers on the bench when we somehow managed to beat Manchester City 3-2 at Carrow Road. It was one of the greatest games and atmospheres I've experienced probably because of the low expectations everyone had going into it. Man City are the result of millions upon millions of pounds of investment. Our plucky shoestring team went toe to toe with them and came away with the three points. Incredible scenes that would seem more and more incredible as the season progressed.

When the transfer window had closed we only had four recognised centre backs at the club, three of which were injured. Hindsight is a wonderful thing of course, but any kind of central defensive cover might have helped. We even loaned out our own Raggett, Famewo, Heisse and Bashiri leaving us with such a shallow pool of cover. Weirdly, the January transfer window saw us cancel the loan of one of the defensive midfielders we had used as an emergency central defender and signed no replacement at all. We were playing a patched up, make-shift defence against the best strikers in the world.

In the Championship our recruitment had been beyond perfect; Teemu Pukki and Tim Krul on free transfers, Emi Buendia for £1.5million...ridiculously good business. 

Our Premier League transfers were a more mixed bag; The loans of Patrick Roberts, Ralf Fahrmann and Ibrahim Amadou were all cancelled midway through the season after barely making any appearances and Ondrej Duda quit as soon as relegation was confirmed. We signed Sam McCallum and immediately loaned him back to Coventry City. Lukas Rupp and Josip Drmic have both struggled to adjust from the Bundesliga to the Premier League. The only experienced Premier League player we signed has been Sam Byram and he has been impressive when he's played, but injuries have reduced that to just 17 appearances. Stuart Webber said that the club had sent Daniel Farke to war without a gun. Only Byram, Hanley, Krul and Tettey had ever played at this level before and they were some of our better performers throughout the season. If we'd only brought in a couple of Premier League players to improve the group, ah who knows?

This defensive frailty meant midfielders who previously had been able to break the lines and join the attack were now having to hold their position a bit deeper to support the defence. The fullbacks and wingers who bombed forward so effectively in the Championship were now being pegged back more often than not. The Stiepermann centre forward/attacking midfielder role had become virtually a third central midfielder which starved our goal hungry Pukki of support. 11 goals is still a great tally in the top tier but they were heavily weighted towards the first half of the campaign. As the campaign wore on the injuries continued to pile up and VAR seemed to enjoy deliberately undermining us with spite. For example: Teemu Pukki's armpit being ruled offside against Spurs. 

We were still playing creditably. Opposition managers would tell us that our position at the foot of the table was deceptive and we were described as "the best team to be bottom of the league at Christmas". That was one accolade I could have done without. I don't believe anyone could doubt the effort of the players, it just seemed that our squad lacked the depth necessary at this level. There weren't player on the bench who could affect much change in the game. However, we were considered to be in a false position that would right itself when we hit our tasty run of winnable home games towards the end of the season. Theeeeeeeeeeeen COVID19 struck...

...I'm only going to focus on the sporting world but it may take years to fully understand the devastation this caused to football. Will some clubs ever recover from the financial impact? All the stats suggest that Norwich City did not react well to the post-covid landscape. If you're at the bottom and scrapping, you need your fans to help you stand taller and fight harder. Even things as seemingly inconsequential as Daniel Farke's post match appreciation applause for the fans meant that losses felt more divisive and lingered longer. Supporters were denied the opportunity to support. The One City Strong message felt a bit hollow. Norwich City Football Club is much more than 11 blokes on a field, but we were reduced to being just that during a vital period in our season. 

Lockdown was hardest on one player in particular. Teemu Pukki was all set to lead his country into the European Championship for the first time this summer. He is their goalscoring hero and at the peak of his career. His family and his whole country will have been gearing up for it. The suddenly the rug is pulled and it's another year away and he's just about to hit 30 and doubts will enter his mind about what position and condition he might be in going into that tournament. 

The season will be regarded as a failure because we've ended up bottom of the league. That doesn't tell the whole story, luck had deserted us entirely. The fact that so many players are so coveted suggests we're on the right track. Perhaps we did an Icarus and flew too high with patched up wax wings that ended up melting. Perhaps we'd cleared out the bargain bin and all that was left was other peoples unwanted junk. With older players our transfer policy has always been "Oh he's not working for you? We'll have a go". I feel the whole season was undermined by defensive injuries, which you can either write off as bad luck or you could argue that they should have been mitigated against with some cover. If not in August, then certainly in January when we reduced our defensive cover rather than increased it. 

In my view, the club is definitely in the right hands. Delia and the board have proven their credentials time and again. Stuart Webber has a brilliant football brain and I could listen to him talking about football in general for hours. He talks so much sense and has such a clear idea about the right way forward. While we have him, we're incredibly lucky to do so. Daniel Farke can feel fairly aggrieved at the lack of finances afforded to him this year by Ben Kensall. Peculiarly it's looking as if we may have a bigger budget next season in the Championship than we did in the Premier League. I hope he realises that he is massively appreciated in Norfolk and continues to manage the club. Stuart Webber has said he expects him to remain because of the way he's planning for next season. Farke saved the club by developing James Maddison and has developed 4 more young players into valuable assets meaning the club is in rude financial health. 

So, I wanted to end on some positives:

If we're going to get relegated, at least we haven't had to listen to the endless "that's why you're going down!" chants from away fans.

Lewis, Aarons, Buendia, Godfrey and Cantwell are all worth double what they were before now they have Premier League experience.

Maybe Pukki's form will put off potential suitors over the summer and he'll be back amongst the goals for us next year.

Maybe the kits will be better next season?

Maybe we'll actually be allowed into the stadium at some point next season? October perhaps?

Ipswich are still in League One. Thank you Agent Lambert.

When I think back to all my favourite seasons of supporting Norwich the vast majority of them were in the Championship...so there's that...sort of.

My Favourite Norwich City XI

The rules are that these are my favourite players, which doesn't mean they are the best or most valuable. I also didn't choose any current players (TEEMU!) because their City careers haven't ended yet so their story is only half-told.

Goalkeeper: Robert Green
Now, I'm a little young to have seen Gunny at his best, Fraser Forster and John Ruddy were both great for us but Robert Green was our scruffy, academy-bred young keeper who took us to Cardiff, won the Championship, was loyal and represented England with us. He would save shots he had no right to and proved our saviour over and over again. Would we have experienced those seasons of success without him? I doubt it.

Rightback: Russell Martin
Russ played a massive part in the success of the Lambert years. He joined us in League One and went on to play 4 years in the Premiership with us, becoming Captain along the way and lifting a trophy at Wembley for us. He faced the press after defeats with honesty and good humour and was just brilliant for us.

Leftback: Adam Drury
Now, Mark Bowen was a huge hero of mine and Martin Olsson was brilliant for us but Adam has to get the nod because of the time he spent at the club and the multiple promotions he played a part in. He was there in Cardiff, winning the Championship, League One and promotion back to the Premiership  and never looked out of his depth regardless of who he was facing. His goal against Boro is an absolute classic. His testimonial game against Celtic was a proper party at the end of the Lambert era.

Centreback: Dion Dublin
Always played the game like he was having the time of his life. He was a colossus for City when we badly needed one. He was just absolute class.

Centreback: Craig Fleming
Spent a decade at the club and in that time he was absolutely pivotal. When the club needed a calm reassuring figure on the pitch, Craig was absolutely vital and was a great captain.

Defensive Midfielder: Gary Holt
Gary Holt was the busiest midfielder in the land, he had to keep things tight defensively while the rest of the midfield around him were fairly exclusively attacking minded players. He covered every blade of grass and was a tenacious tackler. A story that tells you about the man; when a school party visited Colney, Gary rebuked his teammates for swearing in front of the children. He was always acutely aware of his surroundings and the dangers around them.

Attacking Midfielder: Wes Hoolahan
I was never a fan of people calling Wessi a magician, because magicians are frauds and charlatans who fool the crowds...Wes genuinely was magic, there was no fakery with the wee man. He tied defenders in knots, bamboozled goalkeepers and kept the crowds on the edge of their seats. He wasn't a typical footballer, he'd take time to win over every sceptical new manager but once his value was obvious to them, he was vital to them. Over a ten year period he produced sublime moments of skill and creativity and took us from League One to a sustained period in the Premier League and then to Wembley glory. Legend.

Right Winger: Darren Eadie
Absolute legend. See previous Eadie post for shameless eulogising about him. He had that "fud-fud" effect. Huh? Oh sorry I should explain; "fud-fud" is the sound that the chairs make in Carrow Road when they flip up because the crowd have stood up to watch something particularly awesome.

Left Winger: Darren Huckerby
See Darren Eadie. Hucks was a similar player except his Canary career worked in reverse really. Hucks was at Premier League Man City and could have made a good living by joining various clubs on loan for the duration of his contract there, but he decided to take a pay-cut and join Norwich permanently to help propel us up the league and into the promised land. He then stayed with us as the club around him was slowly dismantled and was eventually Roedered out the club unceremoniously. He was an absolute wizard with a ball.

Striker: Grant Holt
Grant Fucking Holt! Captain. Leader. Legend.
His new autobiography is excellent FYI.

Striker: Robert Fleck
Tricky and incredibly talented. He scurried about the pitch like a kid and played with a smile on his face. He LOVED scoring goals and did it a LOT. He loved the club so much that he returned to try and help the club back up and he scored some great goals. Works locally with young children with learning difficulties nowadays. When I see him about it's like seeing a superhero...but without a cape.

A New Hope

Here we are again at the start of another football season in the long life of Norwich City. Last year will probably be remembered for the club regaining it's balance financially and James Maddison flourishing into a genuinely brilliant player. He will tear the Premiership up with Leicester and be in the England squad before the season is over. He has talent to spare and he will play for a club in the Champions League before long, hopefully with Norwich getting a lovely big slice of another transfer fee! He'll probably share the England squad with Angus Gunn, but I feel like Pritchard and the Murphys aren't at that level yet. The young Norwich old boys in the Premiership at least gives Match of the Day some added spark for us Canaries.

As far as Norwich go I'm cautiously hopeful for the season, but also aware there are a lot of clubs with pots of money that dwarf our own. If we're going to achieve something it will be against the odds and hard fought. Daniel Farke is a likeable manager and his knowledge of the German leagues is certainly paying off in our recruitment. We've really bought some bargains from the lower shelves of Europe. The squad looks well considered and nearer what Farke appears to be after.

Random Summer Thoughts:

The new kits are remarkably bold and seem to be very popular. The home shirt's a lovely mix of old and new, well done to everyone involved.

Nelson Oliveira feels like he won't be around for much longer. He seems to have his heart set on wearing as many different clubs kits as he can in his career, so good luck to him.

I really like the look of Pukki, he seems like a busy player with a point to prove.

Onel Hernandez will soon be read out as every matchday mascots favourite player before the match now Hoolahan and Maddison are gone.

Where is Hoolahan heading? I saw he started the Run Norwich thingy, but he must be eager to kick on with a new club sooner rather than later.

The Pink Un magazine is definitely the weirdest Norwich City product available at the minute. It lacks any current player interviews and screams unofficial product all the way through. If you flick beyond the engaging pre-season features by the regular Norwich journalists you'll find: 
A strange 9 photo long pictorial career retrospective on Jamie Cureton.
A 10 (TEN!) page interview with John Kennedy. He played 16 times for Norwich a decade ago.
By far the most cringeworthy feature is the 5 pages they use to pretend Twitter existed during the Man Utd 2-0 from 2005....just...why?
I just feel like if the club aren't allowing them access to current players, then maybe interviews with canary legends discussing their times at the club might be more interesting and entertaining. Surely the success of the Tales from the City books has showed there is a thirst for that.

Anyway, so far we have 1 out of 6 points and have been drawn Cardiff in the next round of the League Cup. Work to do on the training pitch then.

Loving the work of the fans who are trying to create a better atmosphere at Carra Rud. It's already improving!

OTBC

The Greatest Modern Canaries XI - The Best Norwich City XI (of the last 30 years)

We held a vote on Twitter and after 1211 votes the Norwich City fans voted for the following team:

GK: BRYAN GUNN (58%)
He beat Rob Green (14%), Fraser Forster (16%) and John Ruddy (12%) to the gloves.

RB: IAN CULVERHOUSE (43%)
He denied Russell Martin (39%), Steen Nedergaard (11%) and Marc Edworthy (7%) to the role.

LB: ADAM DRURY (58%)
He stopped Mark Bowen (34%) and Martin Olsson (8%).

CB: MALKY MACKAY (49%)

CB: CRAIG FLEMING (29%)
They were ahead of Jon Newsome (15%) and John Polston (8%)

RW: DARREN EADIE (40%)
(Okay so yeah, the left side was looking a little congested and Eadie did play on the right sometimes)
He flew past Ruel Fox (39%), Nathan Redmond (13%) and Robert Snodgrass (7%).

LW: DARREN HUCKERBY (95%)
He left Keith O'Neill (3%), Raymond DeWaard (2%) and Clint Easton (0%) for dead.

CM: JEREMY GOSS (28%)

CM: IAN CROOK (49%)
They beat Jonny Howson (16%) and Gary Holt (7%) to the 2 positions.

ST: GRANT HOLT (71%)
We've had a LOT of great strikers but big Grant beat Iwan Roberts (8%), Chris Sutton (15%) and Dean Ashton (6%).

ST: CRAIG BELLAMY (41%)
Little bit of a surprise but he beat Robert Fleck (37%), Simeon Jackson (17%) and Paul McVeigh (5%).

MANAGER: PAUL LAMBERT (66%)
He beat Mike Walker (20%), Dave Stringer (11%) and Nigel Worthington (3%).

Not a bad team!

 

Of course there were some issues: I left Wes Hoolahan out because at the time he was a current player but somehow Russell Martin snuck in? There were other notable omissions. Where was Bradley Johnson, Dale Gordon, Spencer Prior, Matt Jackson, Gary Doherty(?), Dion Dublin, Darren Kenton, Efan Ekoku, Ian Butterworth, Andy Townsend...even Neil Adams..but ultimately it's just a bit of fun, maybe next time though!

Quick Debrief

It's been a little while since I ventured any thoughts on my Norwich City. There's no exciting reasons behind that, it's certainly not through a lack of discussion points regarding the club. Since I last blogged we've had a season of Premiership football in which we drifted towards a fairly inevitable relegation. We had a strong enough team to stay up, enough of that squad are playing Premiership football with other teams now to suggest that it wasn't a quality issue. Clubs are reflections of their managers and we were a naïve club without a clear footballing identity. Success towards the bottom of the league is built on learning the lessons of a defeat and putting the result behind you quickly, but we'd have sucker punch results like the Liverpool one or the Newcastle one that would see us suffer hangovers for too many games afterwards.

The same happened last year, we were doing brilliantly in the league despite not playing all that well and then Newcastle opened up our old "inability to hold on for a result" wound and we started to free-fall. In his post-match press conference Alex Neil would name individuals who he felt had let him down which is never a healthy thing for a manager to do. A good team win and lose as one. Even Alex Neil seemed genuinely surprised to still be employed towards the end of his tenure. Then Alan Irvine came in and settled things down. Think about it, at the start of that season we had Robbie Brady, Alex Pritchard, Josh Murphy, Jacob Murphy, Wes Hoolahan and James Maddison....HOW did Neil fail to get us promoted?

Anyway, that's the past dealt with, onto now:

I really like Daniel Farke. I think he seems like a very intelligent man who speaks better in his second language than some managers do in their first language. He is genuinely easier to understand than Peter Grant, admit it. I loved the way he handled the embarrassing Nelson shirt celebration issue. I would like him to have been able to have an experienced Championship coach amongst his coaching staff to be able to call on. Someone who could have quietly suggested 2 defensive-minded midfielders might help against Millwall.  He's having to learn an awful lot about the division awfully fast. I think he's great though, I also bloody love the FarkeLife chant. Best crowd song EVER. Kudos goes to the various fan groups making a concerted effort to improve the vocal support on the terraces this year. It's having a huge effect. Although I have always dreamt that one day we'll sing Yellow Submarine by The Beatles..."WE ALL FOLLOW THE YELLA AND THE GREEN, THE YELLA AND THE GREEN, THE YELLA AND THE GREEN" Imagine the Barclay bouncing along to that on a matchday. Someone make that happen.

SO here are some more random unconnected thoughts:

Stuart Webber is a very impressive leader on the footballing side and Steve Stone seems to be doing a brilliant job of keeping the finances manageable.

Russell Martin is an international, our club captain and our second longest serving player behind Wes, he's helped get us promoted 3 times, he deserves so much better than the pathetic booing from some "supporters". Anyway...

I didn't really get the shock regarding our new shirt sponsors. We were sponsored by Fosters Lager not so long ago and we play in the SkyBet Championship...I can't say I was hypnotized into using Aviva, Flybe, Norwich & Peterborough Building Society or Lotus just because they sponsored us. Although Lotus would have been okay actually.

I'm cautiously optimistic about the season, I think it would be incredible if we were to finish in the top two, but the top six should be achievable with the talent we have in our squad.