As honeymoon periods go David Wagner can surely not have had time to unwrap all his presents.

Burnley was dispiriting because it underlined the gulf between a team Premier League-bound and one treading water.

But, to be fair, the Clarets are not the Championship currency Wagner needs to deal in right now. It still remains a battle for Norwich City to scramble into the top six and take their chance in the play-off lottery.

Which is why the manner of a second consecutive defeat at Bristol City felt an even lower blow. It exposed again the persistent questions around whether this group of players are as good as they have been hyped far and wide across the second tier.

The inevitable by-product of a defeat when the Robins’ winner arrived from more individual errors, compounded by mustering one shot on target at the other end, was to confront some of the deeper issues that did not follow Dean Smith out of the exit door.

Whether Wagner can engineer a concerted assault on the top six, or he falls short, does not alter the belief this summer requires more than minor squad surgery.

Impinging on the room for manoeuvre in the upcoming transfer window is the club’s finances. A general meeting on Monday, to ‘allot a number of shares, as the club seeks to strengthen its financial sustainability by reducing the need for borrowings’, to quote the official statement, starts to sketch out the road Stuart Webber and co must navigate.

If, as is reasonable to expect given the direction of travel already this season, the outcome of the latest meeting increases the influence of Mark Attanasio’s group, then it is another clear signal incremental change at the top does not equal the status quo.

An Emi Buendia scale departure to generate funds would appear off the table – given the current status of this squad – but outgoings look inevitable to ease the pressure on the balance sheet, and provide Wagner with the backing to remould a group that feels increasingly stale.

When Webber arrived shortly before the end of a 2017 season that nosedived from an expected Championship promotion push to a top eight finish, and the departure of Alex Neil, he inherited a squad that by his own view was no longer fit for purpose.

Too big, too bloated, too expensive. Players sat in the stands picking up wages who had no reasonable prospect of featuring in the matchday squad.

There are similarities with the current situation but Webber, or Norwich, have not arrived at the same crossroads. The evidence is clear. Wagner has a core of young players, many of whom like Andrew Omobamidele, Liam Gibbs and Bali Mumba, or Jonathan Tomkinson, Jon Rowe and Tony Springett to a lesser extent, have already earned sustained first team exposure.

That was not the case when he first appeared on the horizon. It was an aging squad and he ruthlessly called time on the City careers of players such as John Ruddy and Ryan Bennett. Albeit the sporting director made it clear in both cases there was also a financial necessity driving such decision making.

This summer will see a number of out of contract players, headlined by Teemu Pukki, that potentially allow him to make a similar statement. Pukki is the master of his own destiny when it comes to what next for the Finn and his family, and should he depart deserves the fanfare that would accompany his body of work and indelible imprint during an intense period.

But, more broadly, that is another strand to a fascinating summer. The balance for Webber, Neil Adams and Wagner is to refresh, while remaining a competitive Championship entity.

At Wagner’s unveiling in January, the club’s football figurehead reiterated he still had unfinished business as he approached his six-year anniversary. Getting Norwich City back to the Premier League, and keeping them there, is a seismic challenge, but he overcame a bigger one to dismantle a failing and fading squad. In that regard he is at the same crossroads.

But that can wait. For now. While there are league points and places to play for Wagner has to settle on the personnel who can generate that ‘energy, that intensity’ he felt was lacking in a defining first half spell at Bristol City.

The frayed nature of a game which, bar perhaps a 20 minute period of control from the visitors immediately after the interval, lurched from penalty box to penalty box may have crystalised in his own mind who can be part of this journey, now and in the future.

Defeats to Burnley and the Robins offered a reminder the German’s task is not simply to transform the mood. He must reconstruct a squad in his image, backed by Webber. Both know what it takes. But that does not make the challenge any easier.