Norwich City have had a slower start to the Championship campaign than they’d have liked.
The Canaries have won just one of their opening four fixtures, as they are becoming accustomed to life with Johannes Hoff Thorup at the helm. They achieved their first league win last weekend, as they beat Coventry City 1-0 away from home, with Borja Sainz grabbing the game’s only goal.
Before that, they had struggled, as they picked up two draws and an opening-day loss to newly-promoted Oxford United. In both draws, they dropped points from a winning position, which is something the new manager will have to improve.
It has been a tough summer for Norwich City and their new manager as they lost multiple key players. Gabriel Sara was the most notable departure as he was sold to Galatasaray for a fee in the region of £20 million.
Additionally, Jonathan Rowe was sent on loan to Marseille after withdrawing from Norwich’s matchday squad against Oxford United.
Both Sara and Rowe are huge misses for Norwich, so the club must do everything they can to cope without them this season. There still remain some valuable individuals among the ranks at Carrow Road, and there will be a belief that the Canaries can still reach the play-offs.
They will have to keep a hold of their most important players for the duration of the season if they do have hopes of promotion, though.
Norwich City’s most valuable player
Hoff Thorup has inherited a talented squad and has used the transfer market well in order to strengthen it. The likes of Ante Crnac and Kaide Gordon signed late in the window to provide further attacking options. However, FLW’s Norwich City fan pundit, Zeke Downes, believes that their most valuable player is someone who has already been at the club for the last few seasons.
He said: “The most valuable player at our club is definitely Josh Sargent. He is at a very good age, he’s not even in his prime yet. He’s proven at this level, scores a lot of goals. There’s also potential there for him to improve even more.
“I think it’s quite telling that our manager said that they can’t accept less than £25 million, because realistically that’s the amount you’d have to spend to get a player of his quality and level in this league.
“Market value, maybe more like £20 million, but I think his value to us is £25-30 million.”
Josh Sargent will be key for Norwich this season
The USA international signed for the Canaries in the summer of 2021 following their promotion to the Premier League under Daniel Farke and has since been one of Norwich’s most important stars.
His Premier League campaign was slow in terms of goals, but he really kicked on following their relegation to the Championship and scored 29 goals in their last two seasons.
This season, he has already put his name on the scoresheet twice, once at home to Blackburn Rovers and once against Sheffield United. He also grabbed an assist in their draw against Blackburn, so he will be useful in terms of both scoring goals and creativity.
With Rowe and Sara departing, Norwich are losing players who contributed to plenty of goals last season, so Sargent needs to now step up and hit those big numbers that he is capable of hitting.
Discussion about this post