You can imagine the swell of pride for anyone connected to Norwich City seeing Kellen Fisher, Abu Kamara and Brad Hills all represent England over the past few days.

The Canaries’ trio were part of the Young Lions’ Under-20s pool who were unbeaten in friendlies against their Swedish and Republic of Ireland counterparts.

Somewhere in a small corner of Denmark Johannes Hoff Thorup might be counting the hours before he sweeps in through the gates at Colney to begin his pre-season countdown.

The 35-year-old’s reputation for hothousing young talent at FC Nordsjælland felt like one of the exciting elements of his appointment to replace David Wagner.

A head coach with a firm commitment to development, and providing opportunities to shine in a first team setting.

Perhaps a trio of England U20 call ups underlined he has enough raw material available to push some through for this upcoming Championship season.

Add players like Vicente Reyes, Emmanuel Adegboyega, Jon Tomkinson, Tony Springett and Jaden Warner, who all went out on Football League loans last season with varying degrees of success.

Plus Ken Aboh and Finley Welch, who made their Norwich first team debuts under Wagner, and not forgetting a more established but still relatively unproven asset in Liam Gibbs, and you can see a positive picture start to emerge.

Norwich City head coach Johannes Hoff Thorup has a reputation for trusting young players (Image: Rudi Dalsgaard)

Thorup’s ability to pick his moment on a case-by-case basis holds the key to who from that crop can go on and make the same eyecatching strides as Jon Rowe over these past 12 months.

Take Hills. A powerful 20-year-old centre back who was crowned Accrington’s player-of-the-year after 48 senior appearances in all competitions in the rough and tumble of League Two.

No surprise the Norwich-bred prospect is already being touted with loan interest from higher up the food chain ahead of the new campaign, and League One Stevenage.

But the sense inside the football club is a strong pre-season can impress Thorup, and tilt the scales in favour of keeping Hills in the building, rather than send him out for another tour of duty.

Jose Cordoba’s arrival, and the experienced presence of Shane Duffy and Grant Hanley might suggest the pathway is blocked, but the summer is long, and the transfer window will feel even longer. It would not be a surprise if Hills or a Tomkinson can push themselves up the pecking order.   

For players like keeper Reyes, defender Adegboyega and striker Aboh - subject to signing a deal on the table to keep the prolific development forward - the right Football League loans will surely help accelerate their first team ambitions.

Finding the right environment under the right management, within the right dressing room, is a skill that can catapult a young player much closer to their parent club’s first team, or see them swiftly fall out of favour. Hills spoke at various points last season about leaning on the older heads at Accrington as he scrapped for three points every week.

Norwich City flyer Abu Kamara had a season to savour on loan at Portsmouth (Image: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd)

Even in a highly-rated gem like Kamara there are no guarantees his League One title winner’s medal, and a raft of goal contributions on the south-coast, mean he will now be parachuted into Thorup’s short term plans.

Pre-season feels big for the 20-year-old, allied to a feeling Rowe could well depart if the transfer interest around the England Under-21 international translates into firm bids that are too good for sporting director Ben Knapper to resist.

Go back to this time last summer and it felt there was an inevitability Bali Mumba was ready to claim his place in the Norwich first team. Like Kamara, he had enjoyed a League One title-winning season and been crowned the divisional young player-of-the-year.

But it became apparent very early on in pre-season Wagner did not feel he could deliver, or handle the positional flexibility of swapping a wing back role at Plymouth with a more accustomed full back role in green and yellow.

Fisher’s own emergence, after arriving from non league Bromley, was another deciding factor in Mumba’s surprise sale to the Pilgrims.

That serves as a reminder to Kamara and the rest of Norwich’s returning loan youngsters these are big weeks ahead. But in Thorup they have the right head coach to blossom.