There was too much “flicking, farting and fannying,” said Worthy in a rage after the Southend game. To a minor degree he was right, although I hope he was not talking about McVeigh, who I thought did a decent job in replacing Hux.

There was too much “flicking, farting and fannying,” said Worthy in a rage after the Southend game.

To a minor degree he was right, although I hope he was not talking about McVeigh, who I thought did a decent job in replacing Hux.

Although The Man was tickled by Nigel's comments, what I thought was more of a contributing factor to the final result was:

t Our aimless long balls down the wing from 60 minutes onwards;

t A lack of suitable replacements to bring on;

t An inability to change the team once Southend changed theirs;

t An ingrained belief the team has inherited that whenever it goes ahead away from home it must stop attacking;

t A distinct lack of, well, b****ks;

The Man has long since gone on about our away form - as all fans have - but the Southend game reached a new zenith.

Because let's face it, if we can't win after being 3-1 up at Roots Hall in the second half where are we going to win? Torquay, but that's about it.

A couple of months ago The Man suggested we should keep Worthy for home games and get a new man in for away fixtures.

The more I think about the idea, the more it makes sense.

Nutty Nigel has been at the club a while. If he was ever going to get us playing away from home he would have done it by now.

It is not going to happen.

For The Man, Tuesday marked a point from which I will no longer expect us to win an away game.

Prior to now there has been a hope in my heart before each fixture that there is at least a 10 per cent chance we will win.

From now on I will travel with zero expectation. This is not a defence mechanism, it is based on fact. I think it's six wins out of 47 on the road. Laughable.

Still, the home form is normally very good - but if we are going to do anything we are going to have to win them all. Best of luck. OTBC.

t It is very rarely The Man is ashamed of Norwich fans, but there was an incident mid-week which near sickened me.

It relates to the practice some of our fans have started to implement - albeit maybe one to two per cent of them - of booing Ian Henderson when he comes on. Whoever is doing that needs to take a long hard look at themselves.

The Man is not saying Hendo is a world beater, but I can't see how booing him as soon as he sets foot on the pitch is going to help anyone. He is a Norfolk boy, has overcome personal tragedy in his family - and yet this is how he is treated? Appalling.

The Man would encourage any right-thinking fans to ask any of these people heard booing quite what they are hoping to achieve.

It's not Hendo's fault the squad has been allowed to diminish to pathetic numbers. I suggest those people direct their frustration elsewhere.

t Can I just say…what a miserable company Norwich Union is. Another shed load of Norwich jobs to be packed off to India from the Ipswich Town stake-holders.

Of course, NU will say that the job cuts will keep the company competitive - and therefore protect what jobs remain. But it's all about lining the shareholders' pockets. Disgusting.

The Man understands that increasingly it is a global jobs market, but I've yet to meet anyone who has got any sense out of an Indian call centre.

I hope this policy comes back and bites them on the a**e one day - just like the £25 million they threw away on helping the s**m redevelop their ground.

Come to think of it, I think they make a lovely couple…

t A few weeks ago - ahead of transfer deadline day - The Man urged the club to go out and get Freddie Eastwood.

I prefaced the demand with the acknowledgment that we needed to show some “muscle” - not take no for an answer.

So what did we do?

Well, Worthy explained this week: “Eastwood was a player we liked. I contacted Southend and was told the player was not for sale. And we respected that.”

Ahhhhhhhh!

We didn't even fall at the first hurdle. We never even tried to jump it!

I'm sure we initially told West Ham that Dean Ashton was not for sale, but that did not stop it.

Look at Birmingham's recent pursuit of Gary McSheffrey. Coventry told Brum on at least four separate occasions he was going nowhere - and where did he end up…

Why the hell do we persist with this Mr Nice Guy routine?

No-one does it to us.

I didn't see Southend fans “respecting” us outside the ground on Tuesday when they were mocking us.

My point is that if we are not prepared to bully and prise a player out of ramshackle Roots Hall then we might as well call it a day.

I'm convinced the £2 million we were going to spend on that spotty Division Three turncoat would have got Eastwood.

The first thing Worthy should have done after Tilson said “no” was to get on to Eastwood's agent and go to the papers. Start unsettling the player.

Sure, it's not cricket - but other teams do it to us and it's a dog eat dog world.

Maybe the player was not interested in a move to Norwich - I know it's a common problem - but then tell us that was the case.

At the moment it looks like the manager and board have not got a clue; if they were on The Apprentice they'd be the first ones knocked out.

Good goal by Eastwood on Tuesday too…

As a footnote, can I suggest the club starts putting calls in on players it fancies NOW, rather than waiting for some fly-by-night negotiations on deadline day at 11pm.