David Cuffley Veteran striker Dion Dublin must not have the end his football career tarnished by relegation, City fans were told last night.Manager Glenn Roeder insisted the Canaries, just three points clear of the bottom three in the Coca-Cola Championship after one win in eight matches, would not be taking the plunge into League One.

David Cuffley

Veteran striker Dion Dublin must not have the end his football career tarnished by relegation, City fans were told last night.

Manager Glenn Roeder insisted the Canaries, just three points clear of the bottom three in the Coca-Cola Championship after one win in eight matches, would not be taking the plunge into League One.

And he said he had told his players they could not allow Dublin, 39 next month, to leave the professional game on such a low note.

He said: “It's so important that we get this job done. I said to them today - we had a meeting for about an hour today in the dressing room - and I said 'Lads, six weeks ago it was like we picked up a great big hand of sand off the beach and you're starting to let the sand slip through your fingers. And we've got to close our fingers again quick here. Surely to God, after what we've come through together, we're not going to do anything daft now', which we're not.”

The message was clear - do it for Dion.

Said Roeder: “I said to them 'Look at him sitting there, he's 38 years old, he's had a fantastic career, his career is over in six weeks' time. We are not as a group of players and a staff going to let him leave the game . . . I don't even want to talk about it. You know where I'm coming from. We're not going to let that happen to Dion.”

There was nothing to announce yet on the future of out-of-contract trio Darren Huckerby, Gary Doherty and Mark Fotheringham, said Roeder.

“We need to be absolutely certain what we're doing next year,” he said.

“We all like to think we're positive and we know what we're doing in terms of where we'll be playing, but where a month or so ago that was looking very healthy, just now we've got to kick on for the next seven games and pull ourselves away from any thoughts that we don't want to have.”

He said there were signs of recovery in the last two matches despite defeats by Stoke and Sheffield United.

“Their legs have come back. We had a few games where we looked legless but the last couple of games we've run all over two teams, but made individual mistakes and we haven't scored anywhere near enough goals,” he said.