It was yet another defeat for Liam Manning’s Norwich City on Tuesday night at the Pride Park Stadium as Derby County took all three points thanks to a well-taken strike from David Ozoh. Shane Duffy took to the social media platform “X” (formerly known as Twitter) in the aftermath of the game to make comments amid fan frustration, as that defeat left the Canaries in the bottom three of the Championship. His comments included him calling a Norwich fan a “k**b” and a “g**p”. These comments have since been deleted, and he has posted an apology.
Duffy’s comments
Duffy’s first comment was a reply to a Norwich City fan (Daniel Emery) who was implying that Liam Manning was blaming his predecessor, Johannes Hoff Thorup, for the position that his team is currently in – in the bottom three after going on a run of five home league losses in a row and no wins since a 2-0 victory at Blackburn Rovers in late August. Daniel had quoted that post and in response said:
“Now it’s Thorup’s fault hahahahaha
Get to f**k” Liam.”
This indicated that he is one of many Norwich City fans who want to see the club’s head coach, Liam Manning, sacked after the recent poor run of results.
Shane Duffy then responded, seemingly completely unprovoked, saying “Your a k**b btw” (by the way) “and I know your mates”, sounding like a threat, and it sparked a lot of reaction on social media from mostly Norwich supporters, with a few pointing out his grammatical error of using “your” instead of the correct term – “You’re”.
The next post was a quote post in response to X user Russ Macey, who sarcastically said: “Things are going well in Norfolk…”, accompanied by three laughing emojis. Duffy quoted this tweet and said: “You’ll be so Surprised btw”, basically admitting the obvious – things are in fact not going well at Norwich at all at the moment.
Duffy’s third post was also another quote post, this time in response to X user Josh Stewart, who replied to one of Duffy’s posts saying: “Duffy is on one”, along with a single laughing emoji. There were some people who had found Duffy’s posts funny, and it caused a few debates on the social media app. Duffy’s response to the reply was: “I am (‘on one’) because I’m annoyed ! Ill see you Saturday”, followed by a kiss emoji. Norwich City are next in action on Saturday as they take a long trip to Wales to face Swansea City, as both teams’ managers/head coaches go into that match under pressure from their fanbases.
There was also a post that was quoting the official Norwich City full-time post, with the Irishman saying: “OK I’m annoyed. I get it . The abuse towards me I understand it! I promise you one thing this is heat” (*the best?) “changing room I’ve been involved in”, along with a heart emoji.
His final tweet of Tuesday’s late-night meltdown was returning to his first reply, just before 11:30 pm, saying “Context on this your a g**p basically”. Not really anything else I can say on this post apart from that it was completely random and he used the wrong “your”.
These tweets provoked accusations from Canaries fans that he had been drinking alcohol “again”, having previously been in trouble for drink driving during his time at the club. Duffy replied to a fan saying that he hadn’t had a beer since he went to an Oasis concert at Wembley Stadium relatively recently.
Apology and aftermath
Duffy then took to X to delete the posts from Tuesday night to apologise to his supporters for the tweets, which he posted in two parts. However, after being put through various AI checkers and noticing the use of certain punctuation, such as the use of the “Em dash”(—), which is frequent in messages from ChatGPT, fans speculated that the message may not be genuine after all.
The message read:
“It’s been a tough period, and seeing the criticism towards the team has been hard. We have to accept the criticism right now. Everyone here cares a lot about performing well, and sometimes emotions get the better of you when things aren’t going as planned. (1/2)”
“My comment came out of frustration, not a lack of respect for the supporters — we really do value your passion and backing. I apologise for my comments. (2/2)”
What’s next?
Duffy was scheduled to be back in action this weekend against Swansea City after a stint on the sidelines with an injury. However, that may be in doubt now as he could face repercussions from the club. Liam Manning has his press conference at 2 pm on Thursday, so we may find out more then…
Solid article. No fluff, just value.