Dean Smith felt he would have been capable of getting Norwich City promoted from the Championship had he remained in charge at Carrow Road.

The ex-Canaries head coach was sacked in December after a 2-1 defeat to Luton Town on Boxing Day amid fan criticism over a lack of clear identity and poor performances in the Championship.

City subsequently hired David Wagner and reopened the play-off race with a 2-0 victory over Blackburn Rovers on Good Friday. 

It was the reverse fixture where City supporters turned on Smith at Carrow Road - a day that inflicted irreversible damage on the then-City boss, something he admits was difficult to turn around thereafter. 

Smith was a Sky Sports pundit during their coverage of Millwall's goalless draw with Luton Town on Good Friday and was asked about his reflections on his Norwich spell. 

The comments from Smith come amid links from the Telegraph that he could replace Brendan Rodgers at Premier League relegation strugglers Leicester City. 

Smith is reportedly a candidate to take charge after Jesse Marsch pulled out of the running and could strike a deal with the Foxes that takes assistant and ex-Leicester boss Craig Shakespeare to the King Power Stadium. 

Despite the criticism endured during his time in NR1, City's former boss is adamant the squad is capable of finishing in the top six and believes the season would still have ended in success with him at the helm. 

"First of all, great club with really good people. I had a great working relationship with Stuart (Webber) and the owners. The training ground and the infrastructure is brilliant.

"There was always going to be an expectation because the last two times they've been in the Championship under Daniel (Farke), they've won the league. You always felt that expectation was still there but we had to try and find a different style because we had got promoted twice but failed in the Premier League.

"So we had to go and find a style that would allow us to get promoted but then be able to compete in the Premier League.

"Unfortunately, we didn't have many opportunities to make many changes in the summer. We took Gabriel Sara who has ended up doing really well - at the start of the season he was injured when we took him so we couldn't really play him.

"We took in two lads who we thought would do really well in AJ (Aaron Ramsey) and Isaac Hayden who unfortunately got injured after one week. I thought we needed a bit more physicality and more legs to get us promoted this year and then go into the Premier League, but we had a really bad start where we had one point after three games and were bottom of the league. Then we won six on the spin.

"The squad are capable of certainly finishing in that top six, and I felt we would have.

The Pink Un: Dean Smith was sacked as Norwich City head coach in December. Dean Smith was sacked as Norwich City head coach in December. (Image: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd)

"The pivotal game for me was the Blackburn game. If we had won that game, then we would have gone third, three points behind Sheffield United.

"For whatever reason, the fans turned during that game, and it was very difficult to turn it around. They went after about 14 minutes. We scored an own goal in that time and Blackburn never had another shot, I don't think. Their XG that day was about 0.3 or something - it was one of those games where it was difficult to turn the tide.

"But I was certainly believing that we would get promoted at the end of the season still."