Exclusive: Sky Sports pundit drops claim on Liam Manning's Norwich City future | OneFootball

FLW have spoken exclusively to Sky Sports pundit Don Goodman about Norwich's poor start to the season in light of their derby day defeat to Ipswich.

Speaking exclusively to Football League World, Sky Sports pundit Don Goodman has issued a warning to the Norwich City head coach Liam Manning following his team's poor start to the season.

Norwich City's 3-1 defeat at Portman Road in the East Anglian derby against Ipswich Town on Sunday afternoon has only further accentuated the feeling of crisis that has already started to descend over Carrow Road this season.

This defeat was not only about a loss of local bragging rights. It also extended Norwich's winless run to five matches, leaving the Canaries in 19th place in the Championship table, just three places and two points above the relegation positions.

All of this is turning up the heat still further under the club's new head coach, Liam Manning. Manning was only appointed into the position in June as a replacement for Johannes Hoff Thorup, but despite a busy summer in the transfer market which saw twelve new players arrive at Carrow Road, his team has had an underwhelming start to the new season, which has included losing all four of their home matches so far.

"The derby defeat on Sunday will particularly hurt" - Don Goodman warning for Manning following Ipswich loss

Football League World have spoken exclusively to Sky Sports pundit Don Goodman about Manning and Norwich's difficult start to the new season, and Don is aware that losing to Ipswich will particularly hurt everybody at the club, including the manager: "It's not gone as well as Liam Manning would have hoped at the start of his Norwich City tenure. The derby defeat on Sunday will particularly hurt. It'll hurt the fans, it'll hurt the players, it'll hurt Liam Manning as a Norwich boy and a Norwich fan."

After more than four decades working in the game, Goodman is very aware of the reality of Manning's position in light of Norwich's start to the season: "But Liam's not daft. Liam knows that it's a results-based business, nothing more, nothing less. Ultimately, results will determine the future and the destination of the club, and the employment situation of the manager."

But while losing to local rivals will have stung, he also pointed out that both results and statistical data demonstrate that Norwich's problems are broader than this one match alone, and that this is a situation that needs to change soon: "Things need to improve quickly. They're pretty average in literally all the data you look at, with the exception of conceding goals, and there they're well above average. They're conceding way too many chances, way too many goals, so that is an area that he need to fix pretty quickly. But he needs a win - and he needs a few wins - very, very soon, otherwise ultimately it'll be a predictable ending."

Norwich 's loss at Ipswich was symptomatic of broader problems at Carrow road this season

Local derbies have a tendency to heighten feelings, all the more so when they don't get played very often, and Sunday's meeting between Ipswich Town and Norwich City was only the third time that the two clubs had played each other since 2019. This was also Ipswich's first win against the Canaries since 2009.

But this defeat will have stung Norwich on more than one level. The matter of local bragging rights matters in its own right, but both Norwich's defeat and performance at Portmane Road also told a broader story of the team's dysfunction on the pitch so far this season.

Hopes were high for Manning at Carrow Road this season. He did very well to get Bristol City into the play-offs at the end of the 2024-25 season, and having been born in Norwich and starting his playing career in their academy, there was an element of home coming to his return to the club.

And in addition to this, transfer business in the summer was brisk. Twelve new players arrived at Carrow Road during the summer transfer window, and nine of those players cost the club a fee, with three free transfers and no-one arriving on loan. The owners of the club clearly invested in both Manning and the team over the course of the summer,

But both results and performances have been disappointing. Norwich started the season in an almost counterintuitive fashion, winning their first two away matches but losing their first two away matches, and with the wins drying up completely from the end of August. They were also knocked out of the EFL Cup in the Second Round by Southampton before the end of August.

Now five games without a win, they've lost all four of the home Championship matches so far, and with few signs that anything is improving. By the time they get back to action on the 18th October, they'll have been seven weeks without a win. And as if to crank the pressure under Manning even higher, that next match is against his former club, Bristol City, who've made a solid start to the season under Manning's replacement at Ashton Gate, Gerhard Struber.

Don Goodman is right to say that "things need to improve quickly." Liam Manning needs to start turning things around at Carrow Road and time may already be starting to run out. If he's unable to do so, returning local lad or not, he could find that his time as the manager of Norwich City is significantly shorter than anybody would have wanted.