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David Hannant: Norwich and Australia delight for Mo Toure

Mo Toure is really looking  the part on City colours <i>(Image: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd)</i>
Mo Toure is really looking the part on City colours (Image: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd)
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I'm going to start this week's column, as I often do, with a disclaimer stating the bleeding obvious.

Clearly, when any player gets off to a blistering start (a la Wembley) in yellow and green, it is good news for me.

However, the way Mo Toure has flown out of the traps as a Canary is more than I ever could have asked for.

As regular readers (my parents, presumably) would know, Liam Manning's wretched start to the season drove me to drop everything and move thousands of miles away to the south of Australia, where I now live.

So when City completed the signing of a Socceroo I was naturally delighted, particularly given his career kicked off in the very city I now call home - Adelaide.

Mo Toure on duty for Australia (Image: PA Images)

Toure broke into the Adelaide United team as a wee teenager before pursuing a career in Europe which has led to him now wearing yellow and green for country and club.

As far as I'm aware, he is to date the only player to have worn the colours of both Adelaide United and Norwich City - although a certain Justin Fashanu did ply his trade in the City of Churches too, on loan at semi-pro side Adelaide City. Credit to the great Pete Raven, formerly of this parish, for pointing that one out.

Since I've arrived Down Under, I've come across people in a variety of different football shirts out and about.

Most of them tend to be usual international suspects, with the likes of Manchester United, PSG and Real Madrid providing the football shirt spotters' equivalent of pigeons, gulls and crows for twitchers out there.

I'm not entirely sure why, but Arsenal seem to be the most common - their tat is even carried by children's clothing stores as a Spurs supporting father-to-be I know back home may well soon find out.

However, other than during the week the Barmy Army was in town for what turned out to be the decisive Ashes Test, I have yet to see a single Norwich City shirt, other than my own.

On the occasions I've worn one myself, I've been asked what club it was.

But with Mo proving a Toure de force up front (have that one for free, headline writers) could that be about the change?

When the Australian international opened his account for City against Blackburn on Saturday, his goal appeared on the Channel 10 news and made headlines down here.

His 46-minute hat-trick was shared by the official social media channels of Socceroos.

I was kindly invited to join the Canaries Down Under WhatsApp group this week and there were jokes on there that if a tap-in against Blackburn was enough to make the news, a hat-trick should comfortably see the full 90 played on repeat during the prime time schedule.

Clearly, my biggest reason for wanting his goalscoring form to continue is that he will help fire City closer to where we want to be.

But at the same time, if he carries on in the bonza vein he current is, perhaps he can continue to win fans around these parts.

International fans are spawned for all sorts of reasons - I met somebody recently who was a lifelong Stoke City fan solely because he was randomly assigned them while playing Football Manager.

Others have distant relatives, twice removed, who once went to a game of a random club while on holiday.

Sometimes it could be as simple as being the team that just happened to be on the telly one day.

However, nothing grabs the eyes of an overseas fan more than one of your own - for the same reason for a while Norwich suddenly started to feel like part of Finland.

I may be getting carried away, but if Mo Touré manages to attract the Aussie eye to Carrow Road, all the better for me - assuming my WhatsApp could cope with all the extra notifications.

It would also be an incredible irony if his goalscoring form cements him a place in Australia's World Cup squad - given the assumption this was part of Josh Sargent's desperation for a move to the MLS.

What must the American international currently be thinking, watching the man essentially brought in to replace him scoring for fun?

By his own admission earlier in the season, he rejected his move on the basis he would carry on scoring goals here - and yet he's sat on the sidelines watching first Jovon Makama and then Mo Touré getting an abundance of chances, and taking them.

His face must be getting as red as an Adelaide United shirt - particularly if City hold firm and his move never comes off.

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