It was a matter of when, not if, but Norwich City are a Premier League club again.
Fourteen points clear of third-placed Swansea, who have just four Sky Bet Championship games to play, Daniel Farke’s side have returned to the top-flight at the first time of asking.
Having already reached a mountainous 90 points, the Canaries have wiped away the miserable memories of last season, when they finished bottom by a depressing distance.
With football moving so fast only the Norwich faithful are likely to remember just how shocking their side were. A club out of its depth. Farke lucky to keep his job.
A fourth promotion in a decade is the ultimate atonement.
🔥 𝗠𝗜𝗦𝗦𝗜𝗢𝗡 𝗔𝗖𝗖𝗢𝗠𝗣𝗟𝗜𝗦𝗛𝗘𝗗! 🔥 pic.twitter.com/KVFTziVyKV
— Norwich City FC (@NorwichCityFC) April 17, 2021
Even the most casual Championship follower will know there has been an obvious star man at Carrow Road this term, a mercurial Argentine who is bound to attract the attention of clubs much higher in the footballing food-chain when the transfer window reopens in June.
However, the similarities with 2018/19's title win are stark, a season in which for all their much-lauded attacking displays, when Celtic flop Teemu Pukki's goalscoring took up the vast majority of column inches, it was a 31-year-old goalkeeper who was impressing the statisticians behind the scenes.
The following year, as Norwich dropped out of the Premier League with a whimper, Tim Krul's value to the Canaries went mainstream. Practically unopposed he was named the club's Player of the Season.
It would be some shock if Emi Buendia didn't deny Krul back-to-back triumphs, but this season the Dutchman has been better - and more crucial - than ever.
But we'll get to that.
Squad too good for Championship
Cue comparisons with Burnley who also stood by their manager Sean Dyche following relegation from the top tier six years ago, before bouncing back immediately. They have been in Europe’s biggest league ever since.
But Dyche’s promotion-winning team were never this good. Norwich look set for 100+ points having won 11 of their last 13 matches. As everyone else reaches the business end of the season, in Norfolk it’s already Friday night.
They’ve won the most and lost the least. They’ve got the best goal difference, and were it not for Ivan Toney’s heroics at Brentford, they’d top goals scored too.
Even their second-string attackers would be good enough for most play-off chasers. Jordan Hugill, Onel Hernandez and Kieran Dowell can’t get a game. To be fair to Farke though, why start them when you have Pukki, Buendia and Todd Cantwell?
Throw in right-back Max Aarons and you’ve got a vein of players who could have - and should have - been poached by Premier League clubs last summer.
Covid-19’s squeeze on football’s economy turned the transfer market on its head. You can’t sell off your best assets when nobody has the money to buy them. They stayed and Norwich have benefitted immensely.
Weak opposition
That's not the only thing that's changed. In 2018-19 Norwich reached 94 points, 11 clear of Leeds in third. But there was no early title that season.
The Canaries lost three of their first five and were forever playing catch-up. It wasn’t until the penultimate match that top-flight football was finally confirmed.
Two years ago the standard of competition was much stronger.
Sheffield United, Leeds, West Brom and Aston Villa finished directly beneath them. All four are now - just about - Premier League clubs. Frank Lampard's loanee-infused Derby completed the top six, by the way.
This term, Norwich have raced to several sensational wins, notably thrashing Huddersfield 7-0 in the past month.
⚽️ Pukki - 8'
— Sporting Life Football (@SportingLifeFC) April 7, 2021
⚽️ Pukki - 20'
⚽️ Buendia - 24'
⚽️ Cantwell - 29'
⚽️ Dowell - 42'
⚽️ Pukki - 61'
⚽️ Hugill - 78'
👏 Norwich hit SEVEN past Huddersfield on Tuesday night and they could be promoted back to the Premier League on Saturday!#NCFC
How good is Emi Buendia?
Emiliano Buendia. The Argentine attacking midfielder will often strut around Carrow Road just as Jack Grealish did in the Championship two years before. He’s playing football in a league beneath his talent and he knows it.
With 15 assists to his name, he’s set up his teammates almost 50% more times than anyone else in the second tier. But it’s his chances created stats that are worth noting.
Buendia spawns 2.97 clear-cut opportunities per 90. That’s almost double the next best amongst those who have seven or more Championship assists.
For comparison, Kevin De Bruyne creates 2.58 in the Premier League. Knock off one chance per game to compensate for the difference between the leagues and Buendia’s creativity is still bettered only by KDB, Grealish and Bruno Fernandes.
It’s really telling that when Buendia is linked elsewhere it’s never to relegation-threatened clubs: Arsenal, Manchester United, Tottenham.
The 24-year-old isn’t just at Premier League level, he’s competing for a spot in Europe.
Tim Krul: Norwich's key player?
Norwich have kept 10 clean sheets in their last 16 games, on paper it appears only Swansea have a better defensive record. But on the spreadsheets, analysts see them as auspicious overachievers.
Looking at Infogol's performance data, the expected goals against (xGA) table has Norwich at 10th. They were third in 2019.
What is expected goals (xG)?
- Expected goals (xG) is a metric that measures the quality of any given scoring opportunity
- Expected goals for (xGF) is the xG created by a team
- Expected goals against (xGA) is xG conceded by a team
When your xGA is high, it means your opponents are having multiple chances to score each game. So if Norwich keep conceding opportunities, why do they never go in?
As a reliable, no-nonsense goalkeeper, Tim Krul is often overlooked in most non-penalty shootout situations. But a reliable, no-nonsense goalkeeper is exceedingly rare in the Sky Bet Championship.
Under the radar, Krul is in the form of his life.
Of the league’s keepers with 15 clean sheets or more, the 33-year-old’s save percentage of 83.9 is almost nine points more than the next best.
For every 10 goal-bound efforts, Krul will be equal to a smidge more than eight. Most of us don’t follow football for keeper stats but trust me, those figures are sensational. Over his entire career, Iker Casillas’ save percentage was 75.8.
Be it at Norwich or Newcastle, Krul will get you out of this league. The Netherlands international has continued his remarkable record of winning the Championship title every year he’s played in the division.
Of course promotion can’t be earned on shot-stopping alone. As Michael Owen once said of Manchester City, “When they don’t score, they hardly ever win.”
So clubs spend millions on strikers trying to shoot their way to the promised land.
It turns out having a really good Dutch keeper is the place to start.
