Daniel Farke insists he is not alarmed by Norwich City's Championship downturn.

City have picked up five league points from the last 27 available and go into a crucial festive spell on the back of a 1-0 defeat at Leeds.

'It is difficult to win games when you don't score goals.

'If you are not able to do this then you must keep a clean sheet,' said Farke. 'Worrying would be if Leeds is much better and we are too poor for this game or too poor for the Championship. The same at Cardiff in the last away game.

'The table does not lie. We know we have had many periods without (Nelson) Oliviera, (Alex) Pritchard or at the start of the season (Timm) Klose. Now those players are back, the performances are much better than on our really tough run.

'If I was to criticise anything (at Leeds) it is we have to be more effective. We couldn't create many more chances against a team at this level. We had two or three big situations before half-time and we couldn't find a goal.

'During our unbeaten run we were brilliant defensively. That is why it is hard to accept when you lose a game to a set piece. It is about adding the last four or five per cent. We had that against Sheffield Wednesday.'

MORE: Have your say on our Pinkun forumFarke is confident captain Ivo Pinto will be fit to lead his troops into Friday's game against Brentford followed by tests involving Birmingham City and Burton over the Christmas period.

The German head coach revealed after his side's Elland Road defeat Pinto is nursing a hamstring problem that required treatment in the second half.

'We had to calm him down.

'For the past two or three weeks he has had some problems and particularly after a big sprint in the second half we were concerned but he gave me the sign that he is able to play on,' said Farke.

'I hope he can now return on Friday because he is quite important for our game.'

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