Clement recently insisted it would need a ‘footballing miracle’ to pick up a team with nine points after 15 league games, and finish inside the top six.
But City go into the final two matches with a glimmer of a shot at just that, although a point for either Wrexham or Hull in their final matches would confirm Norwich’s second tier status.
Which at one stage prior to the Belgian’s arrival looked in serious jeopardy from below the pyramid.
“I read somewhere we have a 0.7pc chance or something of the play-offs. I know also, when we came in in November, that the same computer gave the club 37pc chance to go down. So those are all statistics,” said Clement. “The only thing we have in our hands is to go full for the three points now, and then next weekend, and then we will see.
“Because on the other side of things we totally don’t have control, also not full control on winning these two games, because there’s two good opponents. Everybody’s focused on that, like that they’ve been doing before.
“There’s no difference in our approach towards these games. If we had needed four points, for example, out of the last two matches you might change a certain tactic to be sure to get these points. But that’s totally not the case.
“You look back and you think, ‘Oh, we should have taken more points there and there and there and there. That could have been different,’ but it’s not the case. And it’s football.
“Also, you will never get a season where you get 100pc everything you deserve, but the players and the staff did a remarkable job in these five months together already.
“To be in this position now I don’t think that anybody in the building, or fans or journalists would have put one penny on that in November to be in this situation. They did a really good job, but I want to see the same in these last two games.”
Philippe Clement knows there is still a slim play-off chance for Norwich City (Image: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd)
Standing in Norwich’s way is a rapidly-improving Swansea, spearheaded by the Championship’s golden boot winner-elect, Zan Vipotnik.
But Clement put that particular challenge in perspective at Colney on Friday, in his own inimitable style.
“It’s also not only Vipotnik who’s scoring the goals,” he said on the Slovenian international, who notched a match-winning brace in the corresponding fixture. “He’s very versatile. He can score with the head, he can score in combination play, he can score on crosses, he can combine with other players.
“He made a really, really strong impression in all the games that I saw him play. We need to deal with that, but they also have other qualities in the squad.
“I never believe in focusing on one player. In the past, we played with Monaco against Paris with Neymar, (Lionel) Messi and (Kylian) Mbappe. I could have killed all my players by showing them all week all the actions of those players. But I don’t believe in that.
“You need to believe in your own qualities, and use also things of the opponent that are not perfect. We won that game also. So that’s the same against Swansea. They have a lot of qualities. I see also things that we can exploit, and we need to focus on them.
Liam Gibbs gets a shot off in Norwich City’s Championship defeat at Swansea City (Image: Jeremy Landey/Focus Images Ltd)
“For me, they’re on the ball in the top three of the Championship. They’re a really good team, well-structured, they have four or five playmakers in the team. So it’s going to be a big challenge to play the way we want to play.
“Two teams that like to have the ball, two teams who like to score goals, who like to attack, two teams who are aggressive in pressing. If I would be a neutral fan and have to pick out one game to watch, I would pick this one.”
Clement indicated both Ruairi McConville and Ali Ahmed are scheduled to be available after missing the midweek Derby home win. Oscar Schwartau is still ruled out, and the Norwich chief will not rush the likes of fit-again trio Lucien Mahovo, Papa Diallo or Jovon Makama back at this stage.
“It depends how long our season will last. Let’s wait and see,” he said. “They’ve been out also a long time, but they are back on the grass, doing individual things, but Papa and Jov are not yet in training with the group.
“Lucien, for example, is training with the team now, but he comes also from a long way. We need to be smart with decisions when to bring these guys back and not to make decisions about one game, or 10 minutes in a game to risk things.”