Norwich Fan View: A new centre-back, centre-midfielder and striker on my January wish-list

January is here. The month which Norwich City fans tend to associate with being linked to every footballer under the sun only to end up with the deadline-day loan signing of Antoine Sibierski. The month which, in theory, should provide you with the perfect opportunity to strengthen and enhance your prospects for the rest of the season, but the month in which Norwich invariably tend to fail. Alex Neil and the board have made it very clear that the club will be adopting a very strict “sell to buy” policy throughout the month, so the prospect of a big money window seems unlikely – unless, of course, we shift some of our most important assets. Nonetheless, in light of recent form it goes without saying that significant improvement is required, so, should the funds become available, which areas of the squad will Neil be looking at?

Centre-back

Depending on the future of Timm Klose (and his fitness, having hobbled off during Saturday’s FA Cup draw with Southampton), we could potentially be looking for two additions in the centre of defence. Bringing in at least one is a necessity. Aside from Klose, our alternative centre-back options – Ryan Bennett, Sebastien Bassong, Russell Martin and Michael Turner – are simply not good enough if we are looking to mount a serious promotion challenge in the second half of the season. It is no surprise that our woeful recent form has coincided with Neil persisting with the error-prone centre-back pairing of Bennett and Bassong, and nor is it a surprise that the return of Klose has seen us go unbeaten in our last three games. If Klose does leave, or is injured for a sustained period of time, and we are forced to make-up a pairing with two of the aforementioned alternatives, then we can kiss goodbye to play-off push. It is as simple as that.

Centre-midfield

If you asked me at the beginning of the season which position least needed strengthening then I would probably have said central midfield. However, a combination of injuries (Graham Dorrans and Louis Thomson), African Cup of Nations commitments (Youssouf Mulumbu) and poor form (Alex Tettey) has severely hampered our options in the area. Even when all of the aforementioned players are fit and available, Jonny Howson remains to be a level above each of them and a midfield partner of similar to quality to the ex-Leeds man would enhance our squad massively. One man that City have been linked with who would fit the void perfectly is Barnsley’s Conor Hourihane. The 25-year-old has found the net 5 times this season – including an impressive strike against City – and his stats in relation to his passing, tackling and intercepting have been up there with the very best in the league. Some may argue that Hourihane is too similar to Howson for the two to forge a good partnership, but I think that they would compliment each other perfectly. After all, if cloning was a thing then I think most Norwich fans would snap your hands off for two Jonny Howson’s in centre-midfield!

Striker

Whilst he has been wonderful to watch, our dependency on Nelson Oliveira in recent weeks has been some cause for concern. Across our past six league fixtures, the Portuguese striker has scored 6 of our last 7 goals and we have failed to win either of the two games in which he has not scored. With a January return for Ricky van Wolfswinkel a more realistic prospect than Kyle Lafferty ever being given a start, Oliveira’s only competition for the lone striker spot is Cameron Jerome. Jerome has not scored since mid-October and the recent draw at Brentford, in which he missed at least three clear-cut opportunities, illustrated just how woefully out of form he is. It would be nice if we could, but we cannot rely on Oliveira forever. An injury, suspension or dip in form is inevitable and, when this occurs, we need a capable replacement to step in. In our last promotion season we boasted three firing strikers – Jerome, Gary Hooper and Lewis Grabban – and especially during the run-in, each one of them played an important role. With this in mind, I think that a third striker is essential. Perhaps a small, nippy Simeon Jackson-esque striker would be a useful addition to offer something different from the tall, strong and physical Oliveira and Jerome.