Chris Hughton’s reign as Norwich manager got off to an inauspicious start at Fulham on Saturday. After the job Paul Lambert did at Carrow Road, is he on a hiding to nothing?

Overview

How do you replace the irreplaceable? It’s a question facing Norwich City after the departure of Paul Lambert to Aston Villa this summer and one that’s going to prove difficult to answer if their opening day defeat at Fulham is anything to go by.

The first problem with the traditional model of a British football manager is that, results wise, they’re all much of a muchness. Occasionally you get a really bad one like Bryan Robson, or a really good one like Alex Ferguson, but generally everybody wins between 30 and 35% of their matches and lasts between one and three years in the job. When you get a really good one, as Norwich did with Lambert, expect another club to come and take him from you.

And then what? What do Norwich do now? Their whole success has been based around Paul Lambert – his tactics, his players, his signings. This was a club newly relegated to League One and talking about mere consolidation at that level when his Colchester team turned up and put seven through them on the opening day of the season three years ago. Lambert was swftly poached and the success has been consistent and plentiful ever since. Now, consolidated two divisions higher, suddenly he’s not there and a new man has to come in and get Lambert’s players to play his way, while layering another load of signings onto the top of them.

Football is big business these days, and football clubs are increasingly run by chairman and CEOs with big business backgrounds. I’m sure to them the idea of handing over an entire company’s budget to one man and relying entirely on him for the success is preposterous and it’s for that reason that the demand for the traditional English football manager is dying away in the modern game.

English football traditionally thinks of its managers as being, without exception, ex football players. They sign the players they want, they pick them in the team they want, they throw crockery at them when it goes wrong and anybody who questions them afterwards is immediately dismissed as somebody who has never played the game and therefore doesn’t know what they’re talking about.

These people still exist – Sam Allardyce at West Ham, Neil Warnock at Leeds United – but increasingly their work is to be found in television studios. Even the successful ones, like Harry Redknapp, are not wanted any more, or at least not as much as they used to be. We’ve seen Allardyce and Redknapp at work behind the scenes in documentary films recently – passing around brown envelopes, signing players from favoured agents and what not – so it’s little wonder that as more and more successful businessmen start buying football clubs that they don’t particularly like this old style way of doing things.

Football clubs these days are far more willing to appoint somebody who hasn’t necessarily played the game to any kind of level but has an impressive background in sports science, for instance. Led by the success of Jose Mourinho and Arsene Wenger we’re now besieged by these studious, intelligent types who may have kicked a ball for somebody’s reserves back in the day but pretty much turned to coaching as soon as they started shaving and are far more likely to have their head buried in a text book than highlights reels of their own playing success. Would we have seen people like Brian McDermott, Brendan Rodgers and Andre Villas Boas so readily employed at the top level a decade ago? I doubt it.

The theory seems to be that the manager’s role is getting less important. Increasingly they don’t sign the players, they merely coach the ones they are presented with by the director of football – although there’s certainly still an input there and the manager is still the first to be sacked if things don’t work out. It’s what wankers who use management speak might call “the process” that’s the important thing these days, rather than simply the whims and opinions of one figurehead. Managers come and go so it’s important that long term plans are in place for the way the team is coached, the way players are signed and who is signed, the way the club’s youth system works and so on. Therefore it’s not a complete disaster when they leave – and Lambert’s departure from Norwich could well turn out to be just that for the Canaries.

Personally I like the traditional way. Appoint a manager, set him a budget, set him targets, fire him if he doesn’t reach them within a reasonable (key word) time frame. But then I quite like a culture of responsibility and, if required, blame. It’s the same reason I don’t like zonal marking at corners – everybody should have a man to mark and be clear about who that man is and how they should mark him. If that man scores it’s that player’s fault. Zonal marking my arse. But then you look at the calm, considered, strategic squad and club building going on at West Brom and you have to admit it has its benefits.

From what I can tell, this new fangled way of doing things has just as many failings as the old way. QPR, for instance, found no joy in appointing managers and then having Gianni Paladini and Flavio Briatore signing players for them – although they were somewhat foolish to pick people like Iain Dowie and Jim Magilton for the roles because they are traditionalists and not particularly good managers anyway. We’ll see if Villas Boas achieves the same success with Spurs that Harry Redknapp did – I doubt he will.

And we’ll see how Chris Hughton does in stamping his own authority and ideas on Norwich who have known nothing but success for the last three years in which they’ve won two consecutive promotions and impressed in their first season back in the top flight. The natives are already restless after a complete change of team tactics and opening day 5-0 defeat. This adds further weight to another theory I have about the traditional manager = god model: it’s better to be the man who replaces the man who replaced the successful previous incumbent.

Lambert and Hughton are certainly modern and forward thinking in their methods but they’re still ex footballers who manage Norwich and their previous clubs in the traditional way where what they say goes. Where’s the process darling, the process?

Interview

After failing to find a Norwich fan for either preview last year we’ve located one for the second game this year – and in fact he came to us. Thank you to James Scoltock for his time and his insight into the Canaries.

How was the opening day for you? What went wrong? Has it induced panic amidst the support base?

The first game of the season couldn't have gone much worse, and it had all started so brightly too. The sun was shining and the team walked on to the pitch to raucous cheers from the away end. But then we conceded two goals in the first half and shipped another three in the second, and never looked like nicking even a consolation throughout.

Whether it was due to the formation - 4-5-1 with Grant Holt up front - a lack of fitness, the heat or a squad with a few new faces especially in defence who knows, but we looked disjointed and out of sorts. Our backline of Tierney, Turner, Bennett and Martin didn't work and they were all over the place and unaware of where each of them was in relation to both the ball and the opposition.

Midfield was no better. The ex-Leeds trio of Howson, Snodgrass and Johnson although talented never shone and Pilkington cut a forlorn and frustrated figure as everything he tried didn't work. The substitutions - bringing on Morison and going 4-4-2 - didn't make a grain of difference either.

The reaction was entirely obvious. Take a quick look at the Pink'un discussion boards and people are asking for Hughton's head and a change in personnel before we're dragged down to the division below. There was some gallows humour when the QPR score came in, that at least we weren't bottom of the table.

What do you make of Paul Lambert’s departure? Could he have done better than Villa? How will he do there? What reception will he get back at Norwich? Is there any ill-feeling towards him at all?

Most fans expected Lambert to leave, he's an ambitious man and destined to work for some of the biggest clubs about. We just didn't expect him to go to Aston Villa, a club with a lot of problems, (having said that we weren't in terrific shape when he joined us), and had he waited a week or so he could have been at Tottenham.

My gut feeling is that he'll work the magic that saw us do so well: bring the players together, introduce a siege mentality and get more out of the team than most people expected.

He'll get booed by some but I hope most fans just sit in a respectful silence at worst. When players, who have done much for the club, have returned they've been clapped, so the same should be done for Lambert. When the game starts though, it's up to the terraces to come up with some melodic, humorous chants about him, especially if we were to win.

And how about Chris Hughton? Good appointment/bad appointment? How has he been received? Very tough act to follow, will the board and fans be patient with him?

I think the majority of fans agreed with the appointment. He comes with a good track record and high praise from the fans of the clubs he's worked at. He was given a big cheer when he walked across the pitch at Craven Cottage, but he'll have to start winning games quickly. Norwich fans are generally a laid back bunch, but after three successful seasons under Lambert they don't want the momentum to drop. The fans will run out of patience before the board do, and the board can always fall back on the seven year plan they had to make the club a permanent fixture in the top-flight - including relegation to the Championship and bouncing back, which Hughton could be part of.

What changes has he made so far? How will Norwich be different this season?

Starting with Turner and Bennett at the back was a brave choice as was putting Holt up front by himself; 4-5-1 doesn't suit Holt's game, he's better working with a partner. Morison, although often criticised is the better option for that formation. After one game, it's difficult to judge how Norwich will be different, but I don't expect the team to be as gung-ho as they were under Lambert, who would replace a defender with an attacker if we were losing a game. That might help us improve on our cleansheet count compared to last season.

Tell us about your summer transfer activity and how you think the team is looking. Michael Turner seemed to have a bit of a debut from hell.

Compared to teams such as QPR and Southampton who have spent a lot of money bringing new faces in Norwich, as ever, have gone about their business quietly. Snodgrass is probably the biggest signing to date. We've long been after him, and it's with a certain amount of smuggness that he's now a Norwich player - it seems that Leeds are now our feeder club, and if you become Leeds' captain you're destined to play for Norwich.

Other than that, Turner from Sunderland, who showed glimpses of ability against Fulham, and glimpses of being a liability, is the next biggest signing.

We've also acquired Whittaker from Rangers - but was injured in pre-season - and Javier Garrido from Lazio, (season long loan), who could fill the vacuum left by Kyle Naughton in the left-back position, giving Tierney some competition.

He's not a new signing, but James Vaughan is back from injury and was looking sharp in pre-season, so should we go for a 4-4-2, he could provide a foil for Holt - the former Everton striker has bags of pace and is clinical in front of goal.

The team has changed little really, but it's how Hughton sets them up and how they react to his methods.

What do you make of the Grant Holt situation in the summer? Seemed to have the club over a bit of a barrel and forced a three year deal out of them that they didn’t really want to offer.

The Grant Holt scenario was a strange one. People initially thought he was trying to engineer a move to follow Lambert, but in the end it was more to do with his agent giving him some very bad advice and as always money. He was offered two years but wanted three - which as we now know he got - but rather than negotiations being conducted behind closed doors someone leaked the dispute – many people blamed the agent trying to force through his demands.

I don't think you'll find many fans who disagree with Holt succeeding and getting what he wanted, no matter what people think of him he scores goals for fun, but how it played out in public was what really riled fans. And from Holt and his agent's perspective it was a dangerous game to play because our chief executive isn't well known for his sympathetic side and could have quite easily let Holt go, leaving him in limbo until a financially agreeable offer came in, and who would pay top dollar and offer him three-years as a 31-year-old.

Manager

On the face of it Norwich couldn’t have picked a much better replacement for Paul Lambert than Chris Hughton. In his first full season as a manager he promoted Newcastle from the Championship as champions and then set about keeping them in the Premier League with real purpose before being prematurely sacked in a move that was universally seen as harsh. Last season at Birmingham he competed on four fronts well and took them to the play off semi finals, winning praise and friends along the way.

It’s easy to say that Birmingham and Newcastle were two of the easier Championship jobs he could have had, given the size of their support and recent Premier League status, but both clubs were beset by problems when Hughton arrived. Newcastle had just been relegated, had a colossal wage bill going to a squad of players who, by and large, didn’t seem that bothered about playing for the club and a chairman who was being hounded out by the supporters. They conceded six in a pre-season friendly defeat at Leyton Orient and while the LFW pre-season predictions are never that reliable we had them down for a seventeenth place finish that year.

Birmingham were newly relegated as well but also had a cash crisis hanging over them with owner Carson Yeung arrested on suspicion of money laundering and the club heavily in debt. To cap it all they had a Europa League campaign to plan for after winning the League Cup the season before which left Hughton to plan for a season that would eventually stretch to 62 matches in four competitions with a small squad to start with and, later, a transfer embargo to further inhibit him.

He was wanted by West Brom this summer before choosing Norwich.

Hughton, who was left back for Spurs for 13 years and won more than 50 caps for Ireland as a player, served a long apprenticeship as coach and assistant manager at White Hart Lane and Newcastle before being trusted with a top job of his own. He’s young, successful so far and well liked. But his teams have never been as positive and attacking as Paul Lambert’s Norwich were and he found the dangers of trying to rely too heavily on a defence that isn’t used to being relied on last Saturday at Fulham.

Scout Report

Paul Lambert hit upon a formula that worked for Norwich and while his frequent squad rotations meant you never quite knew who you were going to be facing personnel wise you could be pretty assured that they’d be coming at you with a diamond midfield set up.

You certainly could never accuse the Canaries of being negative, or intimidated by stepping up two levels in two years. They scored 28 goals at home last season which was more than anybody else in the lower half of the table, the same as seventh placed Everton and just one less than fifth placed Newcastle. Away from home they scored 24, the best record outside the top five and the same as sixth placed Chelsea. They also scored 11 headed goals, which was more than anybody else, which with Steve Morrison and Grant Holt to pick from in attack and a quick right side of Elliott Bennett and Kyle Naughton perhaps shouldn’t have come as a surprise.

But their attacking instincts came at a price at the other end. They failed to keep a clean sheet in their first 21 league matches last season which was a new Premier League record. So to say there was no room for improvement after Paul Lambert’s remarkable reign as manager isn’t quite true – there was a defence to tighten up somewhat, and it’s there that Chris Hughton seems to be focusing his attention.

He’s brought in Michael Turner from Sunderland – the former Brentford man once cost the Mackems the thick end of £8m when he arrived from Hull City but he had something of a nightmare in the 5-0 defeat at Fulham on Saturday and had a direct hand in at least two of the goals. He was partnered by Ryan Bennett, once of Peterborough, but I would suggest is likely to be stuck alongside Sebastien Bassong after he completed his move from Spurs this week for a fee reported as high as £5m but likely to be less. Kyle Naughton was only on loan last season and has now returned to Spurs so Marc Tierney, who was part of the Colchester team that won 7-1 at Carrow Road before Lambert left one for the other, and Russell Martin, who has scored against QPR on their last two visits to Norfolk, were the full backs although expect another new boy Javier Garrido to step in at left back this week.

Here we potentially have problem one. I’ve always quite liked Michael Turner, and I was all for QPR signing Bassong last January when he eventually went on loan to Wolves. However the former is looking slower – both across the ground and on the turn – than ever these days judging by the evidence of the Fulham game and while Bassong was reasonably impressive for Newcastle he was an absolute disaster zone for Wolves. That looks a rickety partnership that will, putting it kindly, take time to settle, especially as Javier Garrido has now been added at left back which means three of the back four could be new faces at Carrow Road this weekend.

In midfield the diamond has gone to be replaced with a more conventional five man set up that includes three former Leeds United players. Andrew Surman and Johnny Howson are players I’ve always rated, Robert Snodgrass was much sought after for a long time at Elland Road but I’ve never really understood the fuss about him, Bradley Johnson I’ve never rated at all either as a football player or a person and Anthony Pilkington has always been impressive whether at Norwich or Huddersfield.

What we have there though is a collection of five players who are all very similar indeed: decent passers of a ball, prone to scoring the odd goal from a deep lying position, not blessed with a great deal of pace, not renowned for their tackling ability, all between 5ft 9ins and 5ft 10ins tall, weighing between 11 and 12 stone and aged between 24 and 26. It’s not just Leeds United these boys have in common, it’s their physique, style of play and experience too. There’s no balance to that midfield: no speedsters that are going to do you for pace, no youthful exuberance or wily knowhow, no strong physical presence to anchor the midfield. It’s just a collection of five reasonably decent players who all have almost identical games strung out across the midfield. Coming off the bench on Saturday Wes Hoolahan (slightly older, slightly smaller) and Elliott Bennett (slightly younger, slightly quicker) – still similar to what they replaced.

Up front of course we have Grant Holt and we know all about what we can expect from him. He’s a threat in the air and he’ll collapse to the ground under the slightest contact to win free kicks and penalties. He’s been doing it to QPR for several years now so if get done by it yet again it really is time to give up. Hughton’s switch to a more defensive set up this year has seen Holt go from playing with a supporting striker and a midfielder behind at the tip of a diamond to a lone striker role that seems to be the biggest bugbear supporters have with the new manager early in his reign. Despite his physique Holt, it seems, isn’t suited to the role so will have to learn it quickly or persuade his manager to change the shape of the team.

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Myke added 20:01 - Aug 23 it should be very high scoring game with two very dodgy (strangers) defences and potent attackers - a banker 0-0 then!
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Lofthope added 20:19 - Aug 23 Not sure Alex Ferguson will like being described as an English football manager.
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Northernr added 20:34 - Aug 23 Just as well I haven't referred to him as that then - I've said he fits into the English model of a football manager which is an all encompassing guy who's in charge of everything, as opposed to the continental model that is currently becoming the trend.
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Northernr added 20:36 - Aug 23 I shall change it to British for the avoidance of doubt.
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qprmick added 22:45 - Aug 23 Ferguson was on the cusp of being sacked a long time ago. If he had, the whole history of our game might well have been entirely different. Good feature having an insight from the opposition, love it I always liked Hughton even as a player but he is doomed to fail. I have this game down as a score draw, a very difficult one to predict.
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TacticalR added 18:36 - Aug 24 The big question is...how significant is the Lambert factor? Under Lambert Norwich were pretty much guaranteed 3 points home and away against us, although the last home match was a real choker with Barton getting sent off when we were ahead. Even the most experienced Premiership defences found Holt a handful, and if we can keep him quiet (which we haven't been able to do recently) then we have a chance of getting something. On your 'process' point you might find Sean O'Driscoll's recent interview interesting, as he says 'Director of Football...that title should be banned forever', but also 'I am a big process person': http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/18986588

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