Zöe Fail, Capital Canaries Reading my local weekly, 'The Courier' I came across these Norwich City gems:'Few funny things have come out of East Anglia; Nik Kershaw's mid-80s pop career, Ipswich Town's defence and Delia Smith's motivational half-time speeches being exceptions; this is changing with the arrival on the comedy scene of Tony Cowards'.

Zöe Fail, Capital Canaries

Reading my local weekly, 'The Courier' I came across these Norwich City gems:

'Few funny things have come out of East Anglia; Nik Kershaw's mid-80s pop career, Ipswich Town's defence and Delia Smith's motivational half-time speeches being exceptions; this is changing with the arrival on the comedy scene of Tony Cowards'.

Tonbridge Angels (previously managed by Neil Emblen's dad), a local team in the Ryman Premier;

'Tonbridge's most famous FA Cup game came in 1952/3 when they lost 1-0 away at league outfit Norwich City after a replay. Norwich scored a controversial goal right at the death to scrape past their Kent opponents.

Tonbridge Free Press described their 2-2 draw in the first match as the Angels' "best-ever performance".

All this aside, I am passionate about Norwich City and have been ever since my first game at Carrow Road, when City played Wimbledon in the heady early days of the Premiership. I sat in the South Stand and heard Vinnie Jones swear - we lost 0-4. I am usually dreadful at remembering scores, however it was the day I was seduced by 11 men playing in green and yellow.

Membership became a season ticket and I found myself making the 290-mile round trip for a home game regularly; the joy of a win, the frustration of a draw and despondency of a loss affecting my solitary drive home.

Fortunately, when a member for the first few seasons, I saw many wins and draws. Seeing a loss became more common with the season ticket. But this didn't matter so much when the team were playing with pride and passion, sometimes out-classed, but they were our players.

I have great concern for the future of our league position over the number of loan players we currently have in our squad. My technical knowledge of the game is limited but I always understood the loan system to be there to fill unexpected absences in the team rather than be the team.

In teaching, we have supply teachers who cover for sickness and courses, short-term cover. Imagine a school with over 50pc supply teachers because there are no permanent teachers.

What would your concerns be for the school? For the pupils? For the remaining staff? They will generally do the job well but, I speak from experience as I've been a supply teacher, the commitment is different to that of a permanent staff member.

The same applies to loan players. They will do a job, sometimes good sometimes not, then return to their own club, leaving City to whatever position we have achieved in the table.

I hope it's not relegation, having experienced it twice before, but it's looming with goals conceded and few being scored. Confidence must be boosted to ensure wins and survival. With positive thinking by the players and good support it is achievable. I expect the best from my pupils. City players should play likewise.

Finally, I recently went to Vienna. On arriving at Karlsplatz in the city centre, an Austrian woman asked me directions. When I replied in English she said she'd been to England and she really liked Norwich, saying it was a wonderful city. She liked London, but Norwich was the city she named first.