This Guardian chap actually must have done some research for this piece just posted...

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The obvious temptation in the wake of Chris Hughton's sacking by Norwich City is to dismiss the decision to replace him with Neil Adams, a man who Glenn Roeder once said would never amount to anything more than a coach of an Under-10s team, as the last desperate throw of the dice from a club that knows it is doomed. That is certainly what it looks like from the outside and while Adams may know Norwich better than Alan Partridge, the reaction to his appointment has predictably, if a little unkindly, been one bordering on derision. To recap, Norwich have sacked an experienced manager and turned to the coach of their Under-18 side and a former local radio pundit with five matches left.

Perhaps that says more about us than Adams, though. Football tends to deal badly with the unknown ? familiar face good, unfamiliar face bad ? and for all we know, the 48-year-old may be what Norwich, who have been sleepwalking towards the Championship all season, require to save them from relegation. One tick in his column is that he led the Under-18s to FA Youth Cup glory last season and it would certainly be an achievement for Adams to get less from Norwich's first team than Hughton, whose job was always hanging by a thread after the club's chief executive, David McNally, made those infamous comments about relegation being "worse than death" in January. Norwich are well on their way to putting that theory to the test.

The unfortunate truth for Hughton is that this has been coming for a long time given that he has won only 18 out of 71 league games since replacing Paul Lambert in 2012 and it would be a thankless task trying to find a Norwich fan who wanted him to stay. There was open mutiny at Carrow Road after the insipid 1-0 defeat to West Bromwich Albion and Norwich will be on the brink if they lose at Fulham on Saturday. Defeat at Craven Cottage would leave them two points above Fulham, who have a favourable run-in and momentum on their side after winning 2-1 at Aston Villa.

The only indefensible aspect of Hughton's dismissal is that Norwich have waited until now to act and their loyalty mean that Adams is in a race against time to rescue them. After playing Fulham, they have home matches against Arsenal and Liverpool and trips to Chelsea and Manchester United; the odds on them not getting another point are short.

Adams has proven people wrong in the past, though, most notably Roeder when he was Norwich's manager in 2008. The pair clashed after Adams, who had recently been sacked as Norwich's Under-14s coach, criticised Roeder in his new role as a pundit for BBC Radio Norfolk. "It is easy being a manager when you are one of 25,000 sitting in the stand or if you are an ex-player who is now working for the media who will never manage anything better than an Under-10 team, thinking he knows best ? and you know what I'm talking about, and I will deal with that, trust me," Roeder said, unaware off how perilous it is to write Adams off.

During his time away from the club he represented for five years as a player, Adams developed a reputation as an incisive, witty and passionate radio pundit and was responsible for a spectacular piece of commentary when Norwich beat Derby County 3-2 on their way to promotion to the Premier League in 2011. A creative midfielder who also won the league with Everton in 1987, Adams quit his job in the media to become the coach of Norwich's Under-18s three years ago and he was rewarded for his good work with the FA Youth Cup last season, beating Chelsea over two legs in the final. "He was always one of my favourite players," Norwich's joint majority shareholder, Delia Smith, said last May. "He was the best penalty taker, the best pundit when he retired and now he's the best manager ? he is wonderful."

Adams is going to have to be more than wonderful to extract Norwich from this mess and it remains to be seen how the senior players will respond to him. However, those who have watched his teams in the past say that Adams gets players to work hard and commit to the cause, while also maintaining a preference for an open approach. Adams's side had width and he helped nurture Norwich's talented identical twins, Jacob and Josh Murphy.

Hughton's main problem was that a complete absence of attacking ambition meant supporters quickly turned against him. The initiative has been surrendered too often and Norwich, who have failed to find the net in 13 of their 33 league games so far this season, are the division's second lowest scorers.

The indications are that Adams will attempt to make them more expansive, although he does not have much time to implement his own ideas. In more ways than one, Norwich are throwing caution to the wind

Posted By: DrDublin, Apr 7, 15:34:16