‘Recruitment needs to be spot on’ - Tettey lays out his blueprint for City’s recovery
Alexander Tettey, left, alongside Christoph Zimmermann and Ben Godfrey during Norwich City's 2-0 home defeat to Burnley Picture: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images - Credit: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd
Norwich City’s longest-serving current player Alex Tettey has laid out his blueprint for a Championship recovery.
Tettey knows a thing or two about the issue, as he grapples with the emotions of the third top-flight relegation of his Canaries career, having made his 100th Premier League appearance last week.
“There’s a number of things that needs to be in place. First, you need to keep your best players,” said the 34-year-old defensive midfielder.
“Second, you need fresh faces, and when I say fresh faces I don’t just mean faces that are just here to be here or because you want fresh, I mean players that are ready to deliver, that are ready to go into the team.
“Obviously the character of these players needs to be spot on because we know that it doesn’t matter if you’ve come down from the Premier League, the Championship is the Championship and if you don’t have people with character that are ready to go three games in a week, it doesn’t matter that you have come down, you will struggle.
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“We all know what has happened to teams that have come down and have not been anywhere near (promotion). So it’s about a proper reset because there is talk of a month or so and then you are back straight at it, so recruitment needs to be spot on, they need to be good and ready to hit the ground running.
“And we need to keep our best players if we can. If we don’t we need to replace them with the same quality or even better.
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“If not we all know the Championship can be a really tough place to be, but we want to keep going and we want to prove the club and Stuart and the manager, that they know what they are doing, so we put our faith in them.
“But in the end it’s all about the players isn’t it. If you have the players with the right mentality and character, our football is good and then it goes from there.”
City’s slide back to the second tier continued with calamitous 2-0 home loss to Burnley on Saturday, with Emi Buendia and Josip Drmic sent off prior to a Ben Godfrey own goal - which Tettey felt was cruel on the young defender.
“You can see the whole game he has been fantastic,” he added. “In these games as a player when you are working, you are good, keeping your concentration – how many crosses were coming in the whole game? And then all of a sudden it’s him who makes this mistake.
“But he has had a very good progression last season and this season, and to be fair he has improved a lot, and I wouldn’t be surprised if teams are looking at him for what he has done.”
