Iwan Roberts on Cardiff, heading and Wednesday on Tuesday

Cardiff hadn't lost in five games, the new interim manager Omer Riza had won his first three games at the Cardiff City Stadium and they hadn't conceded a goal at home in those three games, so they’d turned the corner and started to make it a bit of a tough place to go again.

I don't get this feeling very often when I leave a ground, but when that second goal went in, I felt sorry for the lads. I was gutted for them to be fair - as soon Callum O’Dowda scored I looked up to where the 1,500 Norwich fans were and I was genuinely gutted for them, because I know what a horrible feeling that would be, what a long journey home that was going to be.

It wasn't what they deserved. I thought they were the better side and they scored a magnificent goal again. They also had a great chance to finish it off when the goalkeeper’s made a good save from Borja Sainz and it's fallen to Jack Stacey, who’s done well, the ball is going in but how Dimitrios Goutas has got back and headed it away I don’t know. That goes in, it’s good night, Vienna.

But I do think Johannes Hoff Thorup went too defensively, too early.

He took Kellen Fisher off before he got sent off. He was lucky, by the way, because he'd been booked and there was an incident in the second half where he has committed what I thought was quite a cynical foul just outside his own box. The ref didn’t give him a yellow card, and then minutes later Anwar El Ghazi, as he's gone past him down the left hand side, he’s pulled his shirt. El Ghazi stayed on his feet and he's let go straight away. If El Ghazi goes down he’s gone.

So you can understand when he took him off and brought Jack Stacey on. But I just don't quite understand why, with 15 minutes left he brings Grant Hanley on and goes five at the back. I said live on radio, ‘has he shown his hand too early?' Is he saying, right we're going to defend it for the next 15 minutes’? It's a long time, plus there was five or six minutes of injury time.

I know Cardiff had a good chance in the first half when Chris Willock should have hit the target, but put it inches wide. Second half they huffed and puffed and put a lot of crosses in, which were dealt comfortably by Shane Duffy and Jose Cordoba, who I thought were outstanding in their own penalty box. But they never looked like scoring in the second half. I think George Long had a couple of long-range efforts from David Turnbull, comfortably saved by him. He wasn't really worked in the second half, so I just think with 15 minutes to go he said to Cardiff ‘we're going to defend for the rest of the game, we're going to try and see the game out and hit you on the counter-attack’.

But they got a massive bit of fortune with the first goal when Callum Robinson hits the ball, it takes a deflection and Long can do nothing about it. The second one is a good strike - could someone have got to him quicker and closed him down before he shot? He has a lovely left foot has O’Dowda – the last time he scored was back in March, in the 100th minute, so he must have a liking for late goals against East Anglian teams.

I was genuinely gutted for the club losing in the manner that they did because it wasn't what they deserved.

We can’t forget Sainz’s goal, though – those six-yard tap-ins, eh?

There are players who are great goal scorers and there are players who score great goals. He's the latter. Everything he hits at the minute seems to be flying into the top corner, but not just that, he works his socks off.

I didn't realise he was quick as he is - he was a threat every time he got the ball.

Norwich shouldn't come away empty-handed, they shouldn't. You look at the bench - he brings Hanley on, he brings Stacey on, goes to a five. Then you look at the rest of the bench and they're all young, inexperienced pros.

It’s a huge blow having Josh Sargent out for eight weeks. Josh hasn’t been as prolific, but his all-round performances have been good, he leads from the front, he has got that presence.

And do you know where it matters most? In the opposition dressing room. Can you imagine Cardiff when they get the team sheets and they go through it – no Angus Gunn, no Kenny McLean, no Marcelino Nunez … and then no Josh Sargent.

That's a massive blow. In December there are six games so it’s busy -  and they haven't got anybody to replace him.

The Hoff might try something different - I hate saying it, but maybe a false number nine.

I hadn’t seen much of Ante Crnac, but he never really impacted the game. He's a big boy, but did he win enough in the air? Probably not. Never really had a sniff on goal. It will be interesting to see what Thorup does.

Brush it off

Amankwah Forson in action at Cardiff last weekend (Image: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd)

I read Johannes Hoff Thorup’s comments about Amankwah Forson at his press conference before the Sheffield Wednesday game, when he said the lad was going through a difficult time on the back of his injury at Crystal Palace and then an own goal at Swansea. It was a tough start for him in a new country and culture.

I get that and I’d love to speak to these youngsters because you can’t let stuff like that worry you. Brush it off and go again.

With all these injuries, there are lads who might have to start the next five, six, seven games. You have to be physically and mentally right.

Norwich fans are a good bunch, they're not going to slaughter you, they can see the club’s on its knees with injuries so I think they're going to get behind every single player that now is going to be called upon to fill the spaces of the experienced lads who are not going to be there for the next few weeks. They'll get their full backing, their full support. They've just got to grab the opportunity they now have with both hands. Look at Max Aarons when he got the opportunity. A couple of EFL Cup games then a Championship debut against Ipswich and he never turned back.

Kellen Fisher - no shrinking violet (Image: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd)

Look at Kellen Fisher as well  – and by the way, he doesn’t mind sticking it about. He's no shrinking violet.

Thorup has a few questions to answer ahead of the home game against Bristol City this weekend.

Bristol City had not lost in eight before their midweek loss to Sheffield United, and they had drawn five of those. And before Tuesday, Norwich had drawn four in six.

Would you take the draw now?

I can't bring myself to say yes – in the Championship, at home? I could never bring myself to say those words!

I know they're doing well, but what a chance for those youngsters to go and play in front of a good crowd at Carrow Road. And a crowd that will get behind them.

Heads you win?

Malky Mackay - guaranteed a few goals with his head (Image: PA Images) I was surprised to see that Norwich City haven’t scored a headed goal this season.

It was my bread and butter!

Don't get me wrong – when I was 16, 17, when I first went to Watford, I wouldn't say it was my major strength. It was something that I had to work hard on for the first few years when I was there. I think it's the footballing skill that probably gets the least amount of work now, because I think teams don't want to cross the ball.

We’d go and do some crossing and shooting to finish every day. When I first went to Watford, Tom Walley would take me, Dean Holdsworth, a couple of the other young centre forwards and we'd head about 50 balls and that's how I improved.

I remember when I was about 19, Graham Taylor had Mark Falco and did a bit of finishing work with him because he hadn't played for a while and he needed a bit of work, a bit of sharpening up, especially in the penalty box. He was the best header of ball I've ever seen. Mark was a big lad, but the way he just hung in the air, and the power he got into his headers was fantastic.

But that’s going back a few years and I do think the art of heading has gone… Erling Haaland is a prime example. He scores goals for fun, but doesn’t score many with his head? None in the Premier League this season.

You have your centre-halves who come up for every set-piece, but the only one to have scored for City this season is Shane Duffy – and it wasn’t a header.

Big Malky Malky would be gutted if he didn't get between five and 10 goals a season from set pieces.

There's just a reluctance to do it - teams now are so obsessed with getting 50 passes in before they put the ball in.

There is probably another factor, and that’s dementia in ex-players from the repetition of heading the ball. Whether that has impacted the way teams play or the way coaches think I don't know.

But no headed goals is remarkable.

Pressure's on

If Norwich were unlucky to come away empty-handed from the Cardiff City Stadium last Saturday they were anything but on Tuesday night at Hillsborough after a performance that was up there with Oxford away in their first game of the season.

They simply never got going, looked lethargic and lacked urgency and never really threatened against a team that had conceded six at home last Saturday.

I think the performance highlights the importance of getting those injured players back ASAP as some of the youngsters really struggled against Sheffield Wednesday.

Back-to-back defeats for the first time this season puts a lot more pressure on tomorrow’s home game against Bristol City who lost for the first time in nine games against the other team from Sheffield on Tuesday night.