DANNY Wilson has admitted Anthony McNamee’s lack of defensive work was a major factor in his decision to let the winger leave the club for Norwich in January.

Ahead of the 26-year-old’s return with the Canaries to Wiltshire this afternoon, Town boss Wilson revealed he had always felt he could not afford ‘passengers’ in his side.

“You’ve always got to look at whether you can have a player of Macca’s ability in your team,” he said.

“If you’ve not got the players around him, he’ll find it very difficult. I don’t think there’s many teams can carry any passengers in any league.

“But again if you’ve got a special one, then you need a special team of players around that particular person to carry on his defensive work.

“I didn’t feel we could do that quite honestly and I still don’t. I still think we need everybody out there who can do their shift defensively.”

McNamee has featured in seven out of 12 games since signing for Norwich, and Wilson believes the midfielder’s lack of minutes has been down to the form of others at Carrow Road.

“I’m sure he’s not played enough football for his liking. I think he’s only started a couple of games or a handful of games over the period since he left us,” said Wilson.

“So he’ll be disappointed with that. He felt he was going to a bigger club, which is right, it is a bigger club, but obviously he wanted the opportunity to play football.

“They’ve been so successful, I’m sure Paul (Lambert, manager) has found it difficult to keep changing the team to incorporate him.”

But Wilson refused to reveal whether he felt McNamee had made the right call in moving permanently to East Anglia.

“I can’t comment on whether it was right or wrong or indifferent. He made the decision and that’s the end of it, it’s gone,” he said.

“They are going to be in the Championship next year by the looks of things at the moment, so he’s got to be happy with it, I’d have thought.

“But that’s a question you’d have to ask him.”