Diogo Jota double seals easy win for Wolves over Norwich
This was so easy for Wolves it bordered on the surreal. Nuno Espírito Santo’s squad have been playing twice a week for as long as Boris Johnson has been the prime minister. Someone should be buying them a break in Mustique but still they plough on and they had too much strength, too much determination (never mind technique and guile), for a Norwich side so desperate for points at the bottom.
Two goals for Diogo Jota, following a Europa league hat-trick in midweek, were complemented by a second-half effort from Raúl Jiménez, his 12th league goal of a sparkling campaign. But it could and should have been more and the gulf between the two teams on the day– only a week after Norwich held their own against Liverpool – was as great as one is likely to see this season.
“I think it was a good performance,” said Nuno, undercooking it somewhat. “We played on Thursday and it was the same boys and our game requires a lot of running. I think we run more than the opposite team and that requires a lot of energy.”
The hosts were fresh from a 4-0 mauling of Espanyol on Thursday night, in all senses of the phrase. It should not be that way: most teams – and those more celebrated than Wolves – have struggled with the Europa League calendar. But Wolves have not only avoided mid-season burnout but have grown into the gruelling demands. And 10 of the 11 who beat the Spaniards started again against Norwich, some in effect starting a second season of matches. Conor Coady, for example, was making his 43rd appearance of the campaign, Jiménez and Leander Dendoncker their 42nd.
With 11 games to go they remain in the hunt for the Champions League, five points behind Chelsea in fourth.
“It’s the way they recover, the way they respect themselves,” said Nuno, asked to explain the secret behind his players’ endurance. “It’s also the way the staff dedicate. We don’t have days off. We’re always preparing ourselves to compete. We want to compete. The difficulty is to sustain that. Every day is harder than the last.”
Norwich began the game the better side and might have scored had they shown greater intent. Afterwards Daniel Farke accused his attacking players of lacking the necessary “physicality and body tension” to cut through against well-drilled opponents. It was a kind way of saying that his players, faced by Willy Boly and Romain Saïss, had bottled it. The Canaries have now gone 536 minutes without a goal from open play and Farke continued: “You have to give your life with each and every duel and I got the feeling that sometimes we were a bit soft and scared.”
After shaking off any stiffness Wolves began to find their bite, led by the irrepressible Jota. He is a renowned runner with the ball but his opening goal in the 19th minute was the work of a poacher. Matt Doherty began the move, getting the better of Jamal Lewis on the right touchline and getting to the box to provide the assist by poking the ball to Jota. Norwich had six men in the box against two but Jota duly spun past Max Aarons and drove a low shot through the legs of Tim Krul.
Eleven minutes later Wolves doubled their lead. A short corner on the left came to Jonny whose cross was looped into the box. Dendoncker got underneath it, flicked it to the back post and Saïss. The enormous defender kept his poise and returned the ball back across goal, where Jota was waiting to tap home. He was one of three Wolves players unmarked at the back post.
That was the game in a nutshell and, were it not for the keeping of Krul, Norwich would have been further down by half-time, the Dutchman doing superbly to save two Rúben Neves free-kicks. In the end it required five minutes of the second half for Wolves to hit their third, a counterattack through Norwich’s outclassed, open rearguard with Jiménez burying the rebound after Jota was denied a hat-trick by Krul’s left-hand post.
Jota was taken off on the hour to spare his legs, not that he looked as if he needed it. Jiménez followed with 20 minutes remaining, to be replaced by the one man rested after Espanyol and the last sight needed by Norwich’s sore eyes, Adama Traoré. The braided sensation barely touched the ball but by that point he did not need to.