Norwich CityNorwich City did not grow out of large capital but from the initiative of two schoolmasters who played for the amateur side CEYMS. On 17 June 1902 they called a meeting at the Criterion Café in Norwich, at which the club was formed. It played its first competitive match on 6 September 1902 against Harwich & Parkeston at Newmarket Road, and as early as 1905 the Football Association excluded it from amateur football, judging it a professional organisation. The club went bankrupt and was reformed in 1917. For a city far from the major centres, it was the beginning of a long road on which supporters have always felt that they represent East Anglia against the world.
The club’s colours, yellow and green, and its nickname, the Canaries, are tied to the city’s history: canaries are said to have been brought to Norwich in the 16th century. The club song “On the Ball, City”, regarded as the oldest football song in the world and probably first written in the 1890s, belongs to the same tradition. Supporters sing it to this day, and it is one of the oldest club rituals in English football.
The first great moment in the club’s history was the 1958/59 season, when third-tier Norwich reached the semi-finals of the FA Cup. In 1962, under Ron Ashman, it won its first trophy, the League Cup, beating Rochdale over two legs in the final. In 1972 the club was promoted to the top flight for the first time, and in 1985 it won the League Cup for a second time, beating Sunderland 1–0 at Wembley. The road to that final ran through a semi-final tie with local rivals Ipswich Town, settled by a goal from Steve Bruce. Despite that success Norwich were relegated in the same season, the first English club to win a major trophy and go down in the same year. As second-tier champions, the club won the title in 1971/72, 1985/86 and 2003/04.
The greatest chapter in its European history was written in 1993/94. A year earlier, in the first Premier League season, Norwich under Mike Walker had long been in the title race and finished third, which earned a place in the UEFA Cup. In the third round of that competition the club met Bayern Munich. On 20 October 1993 in Munich Norwich won 2–1, with goals from Jeremy Goss, whose volley is regarded as the finest goal in the club’s history, and Mark Bowen. Bryan Gunn was outstanding in goal. Norwich became the first English club to beat Bayern at the Olympic Stadium. In the return leg they drew 1–1 at Carrow Road, but in the next round they went out to Inter Milan, who won thanks to two goals from Dennis Bergkamp. It remains Norwich’s only appearance in European competition.
The club’s history has also been written by players whose names are still spoken in Norfolk: Kevin Keelan, who played 660 matches between 1963 and 1980 and is the club’s record appearance maker, and Johnny Gavin, the club’s record scorer with 132 goals. In the 1990s ownership also played a key role: during a crisis the television cook Delia Smith and her husband Michael Wynn-Jones became joint owners. In 2024 the American businessman Mark Attanasio became the majority shareholder.
For supporters the most important rivalry remains the one with Ipswich Town, whom Norwich have played in the East Anglian derby since the club’s earliest days.
The club’s home is Carrow Road, where the team has played since 1935 and which holds around 27,000 spectators. The record attendance, 43,984, was set in an FA Cup tie against Leicester City in 1962/63. It is here, amid yellow-and-green scarves, that this East Anglian story is still told: of a club founded by two schoolmasters that managed to beat Bayern in Munich.