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That ability to go a goal up thanks to a bright and breezy opening only to concede territory and then, eventually, a goal was a film Norwich supporters have seen many times before.
Except this time Gareth Southgate’s England team were the stars of the show.
It was one of the main reasons why the Canary faithful never fully embraced the joy of Wagner-ball and is why, despite statistically being one of England’s most successful ever managers, Southgate has never been universally loved.
He is, I suspect, now overseeing his final England tournament.
The similarities don’t end there. Both are thoroughly decent men who try to impart that same sense of decency on their players – both with mixed results but with clearly good intentions.
But it’s their inherent sense of caution that will ultimately be (or has already been) their undoing.
Pragmatism is, of course, a vital component in the armoury of any football coach, and the ability to find solutions based on the tools available is their raison d’etre, but from the outside looking in, it appears both have been guilty of looking too hard for problems at the expense of the natural talent they have available to them.
For City, the flair and invention came in the form of Gabriel Sara, Jonny Rowe, Borja Sainz, and Marcelino Nunez, but all too often those players were restricted by the tactical approach of a head coach who preferred structure and shape over fluidity and flexibility.
By the same score, England’s strength lies at the dancing feet of Jude Bellingham, Phil Foden, and Bakayo Saka, but over those first two excruciating games, all three have struggled to make an impact, aside from that opening half-an-hour against Serbia.
The England conundrum appears to be around whether or not Southgate demands that the players drop off ten yards when armed with a lead, or whether it’s borne of the mindset of players whose instinct is to drop deeper and protect what they have.
Southgate denies the accusation. The players are less emphatic.
At City, the head coach was clearly the driver of such an approach, which was unfortunate when he had a back four who, when the pressure came, had a tendency to buckle.
For Southgate, there is still time to turn this around and find a way to get a tune out of our latest golden generation without compromising a defence that has, so far, been mercifully sound.
For Wagner, the next project still awaits, so we wait to see who it is who will get to sample his cheery demeanour and uber-structured football.
Good luck to them.
For City’s part, the sight and sound of the new head coach and not-quite-new sporting director singing from the same hymn sheet in Friday’s inaugural presser was about as uplifting as it gets when no footballs are being kicked.
Ben Knapper was quite open (and very polite) around the misalignment between his and Wagner’s footballing ideals, and it’s crystal clear the German’s days were numbered once the initial appraisal had been completed.
Discussions between Johannes Hoff Thorup’s people and Knapper’s people had been ongoing as winter turned to spring, as had the relevant due diligence from City’s side.
Given the amount of work that has gone into the appointment of Thorup, it’s no surprise that he ticks all of Knapper’s boxes, including the one that requires a City head coach to both value and openly promote talent that comes through the club’s academy.
Under Thorup, there will be a clear pathway. Under Wagner, it felt like academy players who made it through to the first-team squad did so without a pathway.
It doesn’t happen automatically, of course, and any manager or head coach could simply load his team with young players and then, when things go wrong, attribute it all to having a lack of nous and experience.
Firstly, you can’t chuck young players into the team when you have no experienced players around them for guidance and, secondly, those young players have to be good enough in the first place. They may not be ready, but they need to be good enough and have all the tools needed to progress.
Again, just throwing young players in because they’re young players and hoping for the best will never work. This is where the hard yards in the academy come in – arming those lads with as much sound technique and nous as possible while, at the same time, identifying those who have the potential to play at the higher level and those who don’t.
All of the above is why the Knapper/Thorup model relies on a well-functioning, well-funded, and productive academy. Without it, the model falls over.
But it was also good to hear that Thorup’s development of players extends beyond the young players. He intends to develop and improve every player under his tutelage – even the thirty-somethings.
Interestingly, he spoke of the value of experience and how his captain at Nordsjælland was 35 years old, so there may yet be hope for Duffy, Hanley, Barnes and co, whose chances of survival I wrote off in last Sunday’s column 🙂
(What do I know?)
But, as ever, talk is cheap. The plan sounds great and there can’t be a City fan out there who wasn’t enthused by what they heard, but only when we see positive outcomes on the pitch will we know for sure that we’re again in safe hands.
Patience is key and, while Thorup is talking up a season of challenging in the top half of the table, we should note the difficulties encountered by Daniel Frake in his first season as he adjusted to the unique challenge of the English Championship.
But… the early signs are promising. And, right now, that’s all we ask.
OTBC
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