Dean Smith: Norwich City part company with manager | Football News

Dean Smith has been sacked by Norwich City after their 2-1 loss at 10-man Luton Town on Boxing Day left the East Anglia club fifth in the Championship, 12 points off the automatic promotion spots.

Assistant manager Craig Shakespeare and first-team coach Liam Bramley have also left Carrow Road.

Head of development Steve Weaver and set-piece coach Allan Russell have taken caretaker charge of the team.

Norwich’s defeat at Kenilworth Road, courtesy of Luton substitute Cauley Woodrow’s 90th-minute strike, was the club’s second in succession under Smith after losing to Blackburn Rovers nine days earlier.

And Smith, 51, admitted in his post-match press conference that he was facing the toughest spell of his managerial career.

“Yeah, probably in football in general,” he said. “I’ve not suffered that experience before. It’s not nice. Unfortunately, everyone has decided that they are allowed an opinion on managers.

“I put myself in a position where I want to be the head coach of a football club and I think that I’m good at it. Unfortunately, because things have gone against us recently I’m the villain.”

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Smith replaced Daniel Farke in the Norwich dugout in November 2021, agreeing a two-and-a-half-year deal in the process, only to fail to keep the club in the Premier League as the Canaries finished bottom of the table last season.

And despite a promising start to life back in the Championship this time around, recent results have been poor, with the club deciding to act now in order to keep alive their hopes of winning automatic promotion back to the Premier League at the first time of asking.

Sporting director Stuart Webber said of Smith’s departure: “This was a tough decision, but one that we felt was necessary to give ourselves the best possible chance of achieving our objective of promotion to the Premier League this season.

“We would like to place on record our thanks to Dean, Craig and Liam, who have always put the best interests of the football club first.

“With just under half of the season remaining and three consecutive home games on the horizon we now have a real opportunity to build some forward and positive momentum, both on and off the pitch.”