David Hannant: Why I'm glad we're not Watford

I was never one of these, I've always felt quite an attachment to our coffee-loving head coach - for many reasons.

I actually remember where I was when I learned of Daniel Farke's arrival - queueing up to get into Cadbury World in Birmingham, which anybody who knows my physique will probably give you something of a chuckle.

I remember hearing his name for the first time a few days before and thinking that he sounded an exciting prospect and his original comments about how he wanted to play the game reaffirmed that for me. It was exactly the football I want to watch.

Again, during his first season, there were plenty of calls for his head as well, but that was never for me.

Call me old fashioned, but I can't stand the managerial merry-go-round and personally, were it up to me, I would bring in a rule banning managerial changes outside of transfer windows. You can't change your players outside of a window, so why should you change a manager?

And this is part of the reason I'm taking such satisfaction from City's return to form under the softly-spoken German mastermind - it is vindication for showing faith in the head coach and patience.

Norwich boss Daniel Farke is the Premier League's 'hardest manager', according to 90min.com Picture by Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd +44 7904 640267 (Image: Paul Chesterton)

Which brings me onto our Boxing Day hosts Watford, the complete and utter antithesis of this approach.

Who would ever want to be a Watford manager?

Vladimir Ivic only took over at Vicarage Road at the beginning of the season and last month, many City fans were a little bemused to see the Serbian pip Daniel Farke to the post of Championship manager of the month for November.

Of course, we do look at life through yellow and green spectacles, rather than just yellow, and to remove these for a moment Watford did have an identical points return for the month, while plundering a greater number of goals, so it was probably fair.

Admittedly, the Hornets haven't kicked on in quite the same way as City did, but two wins, two draws and two defeats hardly seems a sackable offence to me.

But then, that's Watford for you.

In what is a staggering statistic, since Daniel Farke gave his endearing first interview on the field at Carrow Road, speaking of the sun shining and birds singing, Watford have appointed six different managers.

It's astounding really, in just three-and-a-bit seasons, Daniel Farke has outlasted Marco Silva, Javi Gracia, Quique Sanchez Flores, Nigel Pearson and Vladimir Ivic. One probably wouldn't even bet against him outlasting Xisco Munoz.

From a certain point of view, you may well argue that Watford's fortunes in this time have been more fortunate than ours - since Daniel Farke took over at Carrow Road, this is the first time Championship football has been played at Vicarage Road.

But would I trade that for the journey we've been on with Farke? Not a chance.

It's just the way things are with football that certain teams get typecast into certain roles - rightly or wrongfully.

Seeing as we're heading for Christmas and most of us will be playing some sort of party game, how about we give that a go now and play a little game of word associations?

For the benefit of hopefully the point I want to make, I've decided to bring in my column buddy Ian Clarke. These are his genuine answers:

Manchester United: "fallen giants"

Leeds United: "dirty"

Leicester City: "great achievers"

Arsenal: "slump"

Millwall: "nobody likes them"

Stoke: "always rains"

Watford: "chop and change"

While I'll admit a few of Clarkie's answers were a little different to what I was half-expecting, his answer for Watford was precisely what I was expecting.

Whenever a club changes its manager, the outside world reacts - quite often differently to how those inside the clubs feel. I remember feeling a little irritated by how we were criticised for sacking Chris Hughton, when clearly we were a sinking ship.

However, whenever a Watford manager is given the boot, the reaction is almost universally the same. Something along the lines of: "what, again?"

I can think of a lot of things I would like our club to be associated with, but being trigger happy with managers is definitely not one of them.

Of course, the thing I care about most is results on the pitch, but I also love the idea of a manager becoming part of the furniture.

I've never met Daniel Farke, I've not had the opportunity to interview him or be in his company, but I genuinely feel as though I know him.

As a football fan, you do tend to feel like you know long-standing players- like you've almost formed a relationship with them. That's a nice feeling and one I'm glad we can have with Daniel Farke.

Come May - or whenever the season finishes - it may well be possible that we do find ourselves in a similar position to Watford, but our journey will feel a lot more special for me.

If results come it doesn't really make a great deal of difference who your manager is, how often you change them and whether they're in charge three years or three minutes - but for me, it's more enjoyable if you can see a project evolve the way Daniel Farke's has. I'm glad we've kept him so long.