The time has come for Norwich to lose “prudence with no ambition” tag

When Norwich City got relegated to the third tier of English football in May 2009, fans held a banner reading, “Thanks Delia, prudence with no ambition”. This was a clear dig at the then Chief Executive Neil Doncaster’s documented policy of being prudent but ambitious - ‘prudence’ which saw us over £20m in debt upon relegation, and ‘ambition’ which left us in League One for the first time in 49 years. Ever since, this “prudence with no ambition” slogan has been used as a stick to beat the board with, despite Doncaster no longer being at the club. There is a conception among Norwich fans that we always try and do things on the cheap, e.g appointing Neil Adams having supposedly scoured Europe for a new manager, and, similarly, a bit earlier down the line, giving the woefully inexperienced Bryan Gunn the task of guiding us out of League One back in 2009. Both cases were clear examples of the club taking the cheap option in more hope rather than exception of it paying off. Norwich never have splashed the cash - we are not financially fuelled by a Russian billionaire ala Bournemouth and, however much it may frustrate us supporters, for the long-term stability of the club we will always have to be somewhat prudent.

However, it is beginning to look like this January transfer window may finally be the month for for the club to shake this self-defined ‘little old, stingy Norwich’ tag, allowing us to consign the idea of ‘prudence with no ambition’ to history. It is expected that Everton’s Steven Naismith and Wolfsburg’s Timm Klosse will join City this week for a combined total of just shy of £20m. Considering that recently passed January transfer windows have seen us sign the likes of Joseph Yobo (loan), Jonas Gutierrez (loan), Luciano Becchio (swap-deal) and Lee Camp (free) - this represents a notable shift in club policy, and suggests that perhaps there is now more of an emphasis on ambition rather than prudence. Many neutrals are scoffing at the reported £8.5million figure being spent on 29-year old Naismith and would argue that this is certainly not a prudent move - but with Premier League survival on the line, now, more than ever, is time to be ambitious. I must admit that is nice, for once, for the club to be in the limelight for supposedly over-paying for a player rather than not being discussed at all because we haven’t signed anyone.

On Match of the Day 2 last night it was discussed that since the summer of 2014, City’s net spend has been £-13m while Bournemouth’s has been all of £38m. For two very similarly placed clubs who likely share similar objectives this is a stark contrast and shows just what Norwich are up against. Saturday’s abject display proved that if we are serious about survival then we don’t have any choice but to spend and it looks like, for once, the club has realised this.

We cannot afford to repeat the mistakes of January two years ago.