McNally Gets His Man - Hughton is New Boss

Former Birmingham manager, Chris Hughton has signed a three-year deal at Carrow Road and takes three members of his Blues backroom staff - assistant manager Colin Calderwood, first-team coach Paul Trollope and chief scout Ewan Chester.

Curiously Ian Culverhouse and Gary Karsa remain employed by Norwich City, but surely it is only a matter of time before they leave for Aston Villa.

Hughton leaves St Andrews after just one season in charge, in which he guided Birmingham to fourth in the Championship and a place in the play-offs, where they lost to Blackpool in the semi-finals.

He also had a successful spell at Newcastle, taking a team in crisis to the Championship title in 2010 before inexplicable losing his job in December of that year with the club 11th in the Premier League.

Hughton said: 'As soon as the call came, due to the standing Norwich have, and their Premier League status, it was something that excited me.'

He comes to the club with a reputation for being a calming influence as well as having an extremely high attention to detail.

He added: 'The job Paul has done here in the last three years is a wonderful achievement.

'To rise from the first division to the Premier League for someone in management is a tough task and everyone appreciates the job he did.

'It will be a hard act to follow but it's about making progress, making sure we have stability in this division now.'

Hughton, who has 53 Irish caps (against Lambert's 40 Scottish caps), was schooled as a coach at Spurs, where he served under 10 different managers.

He has a reputation for playing free-flowing attacking football, but not to the detriment of the defensive side of the game, aided and abetted by assistant manager, Colin Calderwood.

Alan Bowkett and David McNally have come across very positively over the last few weeks, and with the swift appointment of Hughton have demonstrated their huge commitment and value to the club yet again.

McNally is fast becoming a bit of a cult City hero, as well as earning a no-nonsense reputation with supporters of other clubs.

The last few weeks had the potential to send the club into a bit of a downward spiral, yet Bowkett, McNally and the Board have seemingly guided us through a turbulent period and it now seems as though we are in a strong position to build on the successes of the last 3 years.

OTBC