HE’S DAN & DUSTED The end of the line
TIM KRUL’S World Cup dream is in the balance because of Norwich’s terrible start to the season. The Canaries’ keeper has set his sights on going to Qatar as Holland’s No.1. But Norwich’s wretched start to the campaign has led to Louis van Gaal dropping Krul from the squad to face Montenegro and Norway in their last two qualifiers.
A DAY after claiming Norwich would still have been winless with the bus driver in charge, Daniel Farke’s Norwich reign came to an end.
The Canaries travelling fans had waited 460 minutes to see an away goal then two came at the same time.
They had Mathias Normann to thank for that, as he showed disbelieving Chelsea fans why on loan Billy Gilmour has been benched by Farke.
The classy Norway midfielder glided past four Brentford defenders to break the Canaries’ away day duck on 14 minutes.
Then he sent Teemu Pukki clear to win and convert a 29th-minute penalty.
Rico Henry was gifted the freedom of the penalty area to pull a goal back on the hour and it needed two point-blank saves from Tim Krul to end the Canaries run of 20 topflight games without a win.
Farke, speaking before the axe fell, said: “To have the first win under the belt is a big relief for the whole club and the players.
“After we conceded we got a bit nervous. You either have to score the third goal or fight until the end and show resilience and that is what we did.
“Sometimes a hard-fought win is even better for morale.”
This was a fourth straight defeat for the Bees and boss Thomas Frank admitted the big frustration is that this was the third of those games his team should have won.
He said: “I thought we started extremely well. Created two half opportunities but then Mathias Normann turned into Messi, ran through five people and put it into the back of the net.
“We kept pushing, kept creating and in the second half there was only one team on the pitch.
“I can’t complain about the effort. I believe in the performances and the law of statistics say if we continue like this we will be fine.” At full-time Normann dropped to his knees in a mix of exaltation, relief and no doubt exhaustion
In a frenetic opening half hour he appeared to be playing at a different place to everyone else.
After a couple of long throws had caused panic in the Norwich penalty area, the visitors took the lead with their first attack.
Normann picked up Ivan Toney’s sliced clearance 30 yards from goal, drifted past four defenders before swinging a left-foot shot past Alvaro Fernandez from 20 yards.
Brentford continued to dominate with Krul’s block tackle denying Christian Norgaard from another long throw.
With an equaliser seemingly minutes away, Normann threaded a pass through for Pukki who was brought down by sub Charlie Goode’s desperate lunge.
The Finn got up and sent Fernandez the wrong way from the spot.
The Bees’ goal eventually arrived when Henry volleyed home, but it was too little, too late – just like this was too little, too late for Farke.