Nigel Worthington wants to turn back the clock three years and “do a Huckerby-Crouch” in an effort to fire the Canaries back into the Premiership.

By CHRIS LAKEY

Nigel Worthington wants to turn back the clock three years and “do a Huckerby-Crouch” in an effort to fire the Canaries back into the Premiership.

It was a strike partnership which helped put City top of the Championship table - and the promised land was just around the corner.

Now Worthington wants a repeat of that coup, and his timing couldn't be better - tomorrow is the third anniversary of arguably the most significant piece of business, certainly in the loan market, that he's undertaken as Norwich manager.

Having failed to land the players he wanted before the transfer window closed eight days ago, Worthington has moved quickly in the loan market, with Derby's England Under-21 goalkeeper Lee Camp joining for three months in a deal which will be concluded today, now that the cooling off period has ended.

That leaves two main areas to concentrate on - striker and left back - and that's where Worthington wants to add the quality that brought such rewards in the winter of 2003.

“Ideally I would love to do a Huckerby-Crouch situation, not necessarily in those positions, but go and bring experienced players in to add to the group, because I think that would be good,” he said. “But we will only do that if the right players are available at the right levels of finance, simple as that.”

The transfer fees for Robert Green and Leon McKenzie have helped to swell City's coffers, but Worthington now has to find the right targets, and at the right price.

“The first thing is, their football club allowing them to come out on loan then we at this end being in a position to bring them in and cover all aspects - the players' needs, the salaries and so on,” he said. “And we are in a position that, should the right people be available, and that's the biggest thing, be available, we would be able to make a play for them.

“You'd want them to be long term and running on, but there are a whole lot of questions have to be answered. We can answer a lot of them at this end, but other people have got to answer them at the other end, so a lot of things have to come together.

“That is the scenario we would like - I'm not going to say it is going to happen, but that is the ideal scenario to add to the group that we have got.

“The youngsters are doing fine and they will get their chances, but we still need that strength in depth as far as experienced professionals are concerned.”