Norwich City slump to first home defeat as pressure on Neil increases

Norwich City suffered their first home defeat of the season on Saturday afternoon as Preston North End came away from Carrow Road deserved 1-0 winners. Alex Baptiste’s second half header was enough to earn his side victory as two disappointing performances in the space of five days has seen City slip from 1st to 4th.

It is fair to say that it (“it” being a surprise home defeat) had been coming. Despite winning our opening five games, our performances in each of them have not been hugely convincing, with three of the five said victories being won by nervy one goal margins. Such results have largely papered over the cracks of the lacklustre performances but it has been all too clear for City supporters that we would be punished sooner or later. There is only so long that we can keep coasting along in second gear, expecting to keep earning three points every time. On Saturday we came up against a well-organised, well-drilled and plucky Preston side and, faced with the challenge, we had no answer.

As much as I agree that the players should take most of the responsibility (after all, the team that played on Saturday should have had more than enough quality to overcome Preston), it is impossible not to question Alex Neil. On Tuesday night Norwich supporters were left largely non-plussed by his decision to drop Alex Pritchard to the bench in favour of the out-of-form Robbie Brady. Neil chose to stick by this decision for the visit of Preston. Not only this, but he didn’t make any changes whatsoever (other than the late enforced replacement of Ivo Pinto with Ryan Bennett). When there is seemingly no reason whatsoever to alter a line-up the Scot proceeds to makes changes, whilst, when there are justified reasons for changes (such as throwing away a two goal lead at Fulham), he opts for an unchanged line-up. I am a huge fan of Alex Neil, and always will be thankful for his role in providing us that day at Wembley, but some of his decisions are mystifying to say the least.

City started the game brightly and could have been in front within just 14 seconds as an impressive Cameron Jerome strike forced Preston keeper Chris Maxwell into a save, but Preston soon proved that they would be a capable opponent and could have taken the lead themselves just minutes later. Despite a promising start, it soon became clear that City were lacking in ideas as the game slowly descended into a bit of a lull - a lack of ideas illustrated by the likes of Alex Tettey having to resort to tame long-range efforts. As the first half wore on, it became increasingly, and worryingly, obvious that Preston were more than comfortable and that things would have to drastically improve if Norwich were going to make it six home wins on the bounce. This much was obvious to Neil and, after the opening stages of the second half saw more of the same, he played his hand with a double substitution: Nelson Oliveira and Alex Pritchard substituted in place of Jacob Murphy and Robbie Brady. With more than half an hour still to play, this would be Oliveira’s longest game-time (in the league) since signing for the club and it was hoped that he would take this opportunity to prove his worth to Neil and the City faithful. As it transpired, his performance did his cause more harm than good - he was woefully ineffective and did little more than consistently give the ball away. Pritchard, unsurprisingly, was a more successful substitution and proved to add some much needed added impetus to our attack, whilst his well struck free-kick was the closest City came to opening the scoring.

Nonetheless, despite the introduction of Pritchard, Norwich were still some way off their (rarely seen) flowing best, whilst Preston’s back four were beginning to look increasingly comfortable. As the game went on, with City continuing to perform below-par, there was a sense of inevitability about what was to happen next. The restless Carrow Road crowd could see it coming, almost everyone could see it coming - that is, of course, everyone other than the Norwich defence who proceeded to allow Preston’s Baptiste a free header from a 75th minute free-kick, a header that he comfortably dispatched to give his side the lead.

City were now left with just 15 minutes to try and prevent a shock home defeat and, whilst we had more than enough attacking quality on the pitch to achieve this, there was a sense of resignation that we were destined for defeat. Jerome almost averted such pessimism within seconds, striking the Preston post, whilst Pritchard troubled with a header, but defeat was nothing less than City deserved and defeat is what they got.

Questions are beginning to be raised: are we fourth because of Alex Neil, or are we fourth in spite of Alex Neil? There is no doubt about it that pressure, and doubt, is beginning to increase and the next week will be pivotal for the City boss. On Tuesday we travel to Leeds to fight for a place in the Quarter Finals of the EFL Cup, whilst Saturday sees us faced with one of the season’s toughest fixtures: Brighton away.

Two wins and Neil will have largely regained (or, for some, retained) the faith and support of the majority of the City fan-base. Two defeats, however, and the questions will keep on coming.