Today Norwich City travel to South Wales to take on Cardiff, a team who the bookies said were one of the favourites to go straight back up.
Norwich’s last outing was a draw against Bournemouth, a game where Norwich never really got going and a slight disappointment coming off the back of some impressive performances. Since then though there has been an international break to contend with; a club manager’s nightmare.
It’s very satisfying to see that Norwich have so many players represent their countries and proves the amount of talent we have throughout the team. Not only was it pleasing to see Lafferty score a late winner for Northern Ireland, Murphy score a screamer for England U20s and Russell Martin hold the world champions to only 2 goals, it was great to see no players returned with injury. It’s always a massive risk sending your players out on international duty but it’s a risk a club manager must take. We’ve seen with Sturridge and Liverpool how an international duty can turn sour.
This season has gone very smooth so far and the transfer window was one of the most pleasing victories of the season. We didn’t let much talent go and brought in a whole wealth of depth and experience. It’s a credit to Adams to create a Championship side that is almost up to the standards of last season’s Premier League team. The question is, how is Adams going to keep every single player happy? We have a massive squad full of players who are used to playing regular first team football – it doesn’t take a genius to say that not everyone can play, some players will need to be dropped. This could be a huge issue for Adams who, somehow, needs to find a balance between consistency and rotation to optimise the players we have.
Anyway, on to Cardiff today. Last season we travelled to the Cardiff City Stadium full of optimism only to be defeated despite dominating the game and being on the receiving end of ‘save of the season’ from former Norwich goalkeeper David Marshall. This season we once again travel to Cardiff with optimism but this time we now have the mindset of ‘anything is possible’. We have shown this season just what we are capable of. We have been the only team this season to dominate Watford and turnover Blackburn when we wanted to. Adams is trying and – at the moment – successfully changing the way Norwich play and is determined to bounce straight back up; no messing about this time.
Cardiff are also very confident going into this game after having a successful transfer window, one of their new signings is Pilkington who many Norwich fans were angered with the measly price we received for the acute winger. Cardiff can also boast talent such as Le Fondre, Macheda and Adeyemi. It’s certainly going to be a tough test for Adams’ men.
I fully expect Adams to change the back line around once again. With the returning Olsson almost certainly going back into the team and new signing Hooiveld challenging Whittaker for a place, it will be interesting to see who Adams thinks will be the best combination to take on an experienced Cardiff lineup.
My preferred line up :
I predict a draw in this game, Norwich didn’t look fantastic last time out but if I have learnt anything from being back in the championship, it’s that this league is incredibly inconsistent and anything can happen. Cardiff will be dangerous with the combination of the strong Kenwyne Jones and poacher Adam Le Fondre and this will be the threat Norwich have to look out for. A point will be pleasing here, but if we really want to prove what we can do, of course a win is needed.
