What a bad Sunday for Town, losing away at Norwich today. I felt sure Town would rise to the occasion (games just do not get bigger or better than this derby) but they didn’t! I thought Town would win and predicted a 3-0 Town win. Now though,I feel jaundiced by this result as most fans and players do too.

I watched the game live on Sky tv and Town matched Norwich throughout the whole match and had chances to score but they weren’t taken. Norwich didn’t have many chances either but they carried more of a threat in their whole team (Grabban and Jerome especially and particularly Bradley Johnson). They took the 2 best chances they had but in truth they arose from Town errors.

First a counter attack from Norwich somehow saw a cross from wide go through the Town box and unfortunately Luke Chambers was ball watching and hadn’t a clue Johnson was running in behind him. Johnson’s shot was great and Chambers block was too late and of no use and the shot went high and hard into the goal past keeper Bialkowski.

The second Norwich goal was a race by newly arrived substitute Jerome, with a cross in the box and Mings and keeper Bartoscz Bialkowski got in a muddle with Grabban and the ball bounced tamely into the net. That was effectively game over.

Town really sorely lacked any linkage from their midfield to the strikers. Murphy and Sears were quiet but had no quality service to get the ball in good areas. Sears had a good chance from Murphy but Norwich keeper Ruddy made a fine save. Chris Woods (newly arrived on loan from Leicester) came on late in the second half and should have scored with a free header. Chaplow played the first half and was full of energy but without quality and Varney played the second half and was much the same.

Too often Town lumped balls forward from the back or midfield that failed to get anywhere! A huge lack of quality in the Town midfield. No one really got on the ball and took on the Norwich players and went forward past players. The only exception was Tyrone Mings who did try when he had the ball and Sears was good as usual with the ball but he hardly had it and contributed little by the end.

So that unfortunately is another opportunity Town have wasted in the promotion chase. The team were only average today and they need to be better than just average to win and contest the remaining games to the end of the season. Norwich go above Town in the table..End of the bad news. 🙁

Now the Town team must learn from this match and move forward positively to the next game 🙂

COME ON YOU BLUES!