“We are not innovators yet:” Norwich City

In winning promotion to the Premier League in 2019, Norwich City came into the spotlight for their innovative model and approach.

One in which sporting director Stuart Webber and German manager Daniel Farke were accredited in their roles for transforming the Norfolk based club both on and off the pitch.

Despite the Canaries modest financial means, the duo helped foster a sense of a footballing outlook, one in which there was a whole club ethos and a clear philosophy that resonated with fans.

Leading others in terms of their self-sustainable model, smart recruitment and transparency, they remain perhaps the best amalgamation of how the ideals of German football can be implemented at an English football club and therefore its fans.

Gathering views from journalists, staff and players at the club, and bringing together views from others spoken to in the process, Norwich City exemplify how they could well be innovators for moulding and maintaining a clear football identity across all its multi-facets and most importantly the fans.

The community as the foundation of the club

As mentioned in the discussion with Dr Joel Rookwood, it was evident that culture and identities must be organic from the ground up and that it start with the fans of the football club.

For Rookwood, the key was about what fans believe in and what they stand for and making that be-known to the football club for whom the community is served by.

As many German football clubs exemplify, quite literally with the 50+1 rule, there must be a modernisation of tradition – one that allows the clubs to recognise their historic values and continue to represent it today.

In conversation with local fan-come- journalist, Connor Southwell, this was particularly evident in the approach of Norwich City.

Southwell works for local news outlet The Eastern Press and initially made his name through writing and contributing to local fan media. 

He explained that, from his experience growing up and living in the area, the Norfolk based club is all about community and it’s fans– one that is indeed deeply linked with its football club.

“I think a massive part of Norwich is all about community and to me I feel like that if somebody wants to be involved at the club in a prominent role, they’ve got to understand that they are serving,” he said.

“If you look at the ownership model of the club from the off, it’s not an egotistical one.

“We have local owners in Delia Smith and Michael Wynn-Jones who essentially look to balance the books every year and make sure the club still exists.

“It’s quite a unique way to run a football club, but it represents us as a very inclusive city, and it has to be because we are geographically detached from everywhere else. 

“What we’ve seen from our manager (Daniel Farke) is a willingness to buy into our community and I think his ability to understand supporters is something that stems from his experience in Germany before.

“I think he understands that his position is to serve the community and I think he takes that on board in every decision he makes. “

The importance of the role of sporting director Stuart Webber and head coach Daniel Farke

Coming in from a similar role at Huddersfield Town, Stuart Webber was appointed at Norwich City in 2017 to become the clubs sporting director.

Although tasked with helping the club manage its unhealthy financial situation, Webber was part of a move to restructure the entire model of the club – one with values of honesty and transparency at the forefront.

Southwell explained to me that Webber’s appointment signalled to the fans a move away from a hierarchy based on omnipotence to one with a level of cohesion and openness.

An environment where fans, in a similar vein to clubs in Germany, could be informed, educated and updated with the running of their football club.

“I think the key was (Webber’s) honesty,” he explained.

“He didn’t come in and give Norwich City fans political answers about how they deserved to be in the Premier League.

“He outlined a vision and said that they would probably need four transfer windows to get where they wanted to be.

“For a football fan to sit back and hear long term planning like that is not easy but I know, speaking as a supporter, he (Stuart) has, in three years, changed the way I think about football and that is quite a big statement to say.”

In the discussion with Jonathan Harding, it was pointed out that innovation at clubs can sometimes come out of change of circumstance and necessity.

His suggestion, based off his own experience covering German football in particular, is that there are certain kind of situations that forces certain decisions at clubs to be made.

As a result, these clubs can end up discovering the best possible approach and end up doing something different.

Webber, having embodied the role of the sporting director, harnessed the clubs financial situation as a platform to open a new line of communication and educate fans about the running of the football club. 

In a striking interview for Wales Online, Webber identified his belief that sporting directors in the UK need to educate fans about what it’s like to mould and maintain a philosophy at a football club.

"I think we can do better still in educating people to have a strong philosophy, to have a strong belief and stick to it,” he told the Welsh outlet.

"The time you need to really stick to it, is when it’s not working.

“Now that it’s worked with Norwich everyone’s going to be talking about it being the model to follow.”

The recognition of finding a manager who would help implement his vision led him to appoint Daniel Farke who, at the time, was managing Borussia Dortmund’s under 23s. 

Farke was bred in Germany’s coaching environment, one where there is recognition of the coach’s role as a component of a system within the footballing model.  

His appointment, given his background in youth coaching, adhered itself to the Canaries new approach thanks to the German’s eagerness to forge new talents and give opportunities to young players.

The team that eventually won promotion in 2019 was brimming with an eclectic mix of young talent from both the local area and abroad. 

Southwell explained that this approach was one that resonated with the fans by reflecting the values of the community on the pitch.

 He explained: “There’s a real pride in the fan base that they are giving them this opportunity and that they’ll kind of come, but that’s probably because Norwich is quite detached from the rest of the UK.

“Naturally, I think that is why we saw so many younger players coming through in the first team as he was building with hindsight for the future. “

In attending Norwich City’s game at home to Wolverhampton Wanderers in December 2019, it was evident that Farke and Norwich had succeeded in maintaining this footballing outlook and identity, even if the results were not forthcoming. 

Despite a resounding first half display capped off by a superb finish from academy graduate Todd Cantwell, Wolves resiliently fought back to defeat the Canaries 2-1.

At the press conference after the game, Farke was questioned on his opinion of the performance despite the result and once again highlighted that, in line with the German ideals, success can come in many forms.

He said: “Despite the loss today, we showed what we were capable of in terms of style of play.

“If chances had gone in today, the perception of the performance would’ve been about an offensive firework, but we didn’t.

“We can’t be too addicted to the table because otherwise I wouldn’t be in a position to sign a long term contract.

“I knew exactly what kind of position we (as a newly promoted club) would be facing. It is going to be tremendously tough to stay in this division, but we will do everything we can to survive and be brave in doing so.”

The buy in from the players has also contributed to this overall outlook.

Speaking to Bosnian midfielder Mario Vrančić after the sides 2-1 victory over Burnley in the FA Cup, the former SV Darmstadt 98 player revealed that there was an understanding among the team of how they must stick to the clubs philosophy and style of play.

He said: “I think on the pitch you can see that it works well, the results aren’t always the best but you can see that we want to attack teams.

“I’ve had a lot of time on the bench this season and that’s life, but you can see that when I or any other players comes into the team like today, we are cohesive in that approach.”

Norwich as a club that is outward looking and open minded

Norwich’s geographical position on the peripheries of England’s traditional heartlands has leant to opinions within their fan community that there is a necessity to be outward looking in order to connect with others.

In conversation with Journalist Michael Bailey, who is the Norwich City reporter for The Athletic, he explained to me that this approach to life was partly the reason, he feels, that Farke has been accepted into the club so well.

“I think so much of it comes down to the club being in the right place for it. I don’t think you can underestimate how open minded things have been at Norwich in terms of their transition,” he said.

“I think the city itself is very open minded. Farke is their first foreign manager and the goodwill he had in his first few months was remarkable given that matters on the pitch weren’t always great.

“I think that’s been a great benefit for Norwich in that they had that opportunity and ability to give him the right environment to thrive. I think that was the case at Huddersfield and it’s clear to see it at Liverpool.

“The acceptance from the fans and the club is important as Daniel needed patience and, given the cyclical nature of football, I don’t think many clubs would’ve kept faith with him beyond his first year given our poor position in the table. “

Over the past few years Brexit and the consequential debate that has transpired as a result, has left the results of the 2016 referendum as a barometer to gauge how areas viewed themselves in both the context of the country and in the context of Europe.

It was telling that Bailey mentioned to me in our discussion, therefore, that Norwich was an area that voted to remain in the EU referendum despite being in a county that was solidly leave.

The feeling, therefore, was that city and community needed a medium in which to reassert and establish its own opinion and approach and what better way to do it than through its football club.

“Norwich, for me, has always been quite outward looking, even though people feel like it’s a backwater and I think that needed to be represented,” he said.

“Therefore, I think having a German coach, bringing in a style of football that he has, it makes a difference as I think it all filters into what Norwich are and it even appeals to the fans who have been around the club for decades.”

The whole club ethos

All of the aforementioned points have brought together the club as a whole whereby the fans, the manager, the players and the sporting director are in cohesion, breaking the ‘holy trinity’ that Rookwood exemplified in our discussion. 

Norwich are doing things differently and, as Connor Southwell pointed out to me, that’s why the fans, who are the most important in the equation, are buying into the project.

He said: “For a fan you see two guys at the top who don’t merely want us to fit into a system and that’s what makes them so good at connecting with people and the city.

“This is a city that is quite detached, and proud of that, but it’s certainly not quiet and Farke’s football is very reflective of what the city is like and I think Norwich fans buy into that.

“I’ve got the impression that those from outside of the city, who see Norwich as a bit soft because of their strong identity with art and literature and as a family club opposed to something more bullish, but I think Farke has found a way to play that is attacking, ruthless and being a bit different.

“People in Norwich are a bit different, different to the rest of Norfolk and also different to the rest of the UK and that’s why it works.

“I think that Stuart Webber and Daniel Farke have brought in that consistency in approach.

“As long as you as the club get that ‘buy in’ from the fans like you do here, then you have a lot more faith in it.”

Role as Innovators?

In my discussion with Harding, football can be considered to be a game based around perception.

The globalised Premier League football landscape has, as he suggested is the case in many sports, is a lot to do with how something looks rather how it is done.

It could be argued that Norwich City’s rise back to the first division at the end of the 2018/19 season may have glamorised their approach, but whether they will be trendsetters as innovators in terms of their working environment, communication with fans and most importantly there strong identity is a different matter.

 “From what I have learnt, I think that football clubs need to be seen to be sending money to show ambition,” Southwell suggested in his response to the question.

“Perhaps they think that the two are intrinsically linked and that is a problem with perception in the country as a whole.

“I wouldn’t have Norwich down as innovators yet because I don’t think many clubs have taken the same approach with fans -we have remained unique in what we are doing.

“My hope however for the state of the game, as ultimately I am a fan of English football, is that we have shown other clubs and fan bases in this country what is possible in doing things differently.”