On that occasion I was among those wedged into the curiously counterintuitive swivelling seats in the Carrow Road press box to witness a crucial match for the struggling home side against Manchester City. After a first half in which Norwich had gone 2-0 up, only to be pegged back to 2-2, we suddenly found ourselves - insofar as was practicable - sitting on the edges of our seats as Smith emerged purposefully alongside the club announcer in the centre circle, commandeered the microphone and addressed the home fans thus: "A message for the best football supporters in the world: we need a 12th man here. Where are you? Where are you? Let's be 'avin' you! Come on!"

It’s odd, but for years I recalled her adding the words “Cry ‘God for Harry, England and St George!” I must have been getting her mixed up with someone else.

Anyway. Smith’s rhetoric proved ultimately unfruitful, as Norwich lost 3-2 to a team which finished with 10 men. It did, however, have the effect of causing many to assume she had partaken a little too liberally of the boardroom hospitality.

"She's an interesting character sometimes, particularly when the red wine is flowing in the boardroom and it sounds like one or two glasses had been flowing more than they should have done," said Rob Emery, of the Norwich Supporters Consultative Group.

"But you can't knock someone who has put as much time, effort and money into the club as she and her husband have done."

Who knows how fair Emery’s first inference was? But as to his second statement – of that there can surely be no doubt.

The previous season, when Norwich engineered a triumphant return to the Premier League after an absence of nine years, I covered a home game against fellow promotion contenders West Bromwich Albion during which, at one point, the television monitors showed Smith waving madly from the stands.

The woman who had added millions of pounds to the Carrow Road pot in recent years, and who had already received a touching tribute from the visiting fans - "You're s***, and you can't cook eggs, you're s***, and you can't cook eggs..." - was merely welcoming a substitute on to the field. She looked as if her soufflé had just risen.

And just a month before her noteworthy pitch invasion in the Manchester City match, she was being similarly demonstrative after Norwich had earned a precious point on a pig of a day in Portsmouth.

Over Fratton Park’s churned turf she skipped, her green and yellow scarf clashing shamelessly with what one hoped was a fake fur coat, her arms clapping madly above her head in salute to the travelling fans who had stood for two hours in swirling rain.

Smith may be one of the less demonstrative of our television cooks, but once in the environment of the club where she has ladled out millions as a director since 2001 she becomes a veritable Ainsley Harriot.

As things turned out last night, there was no requirement for her to amp things up, as Norwich produced a spirited 4-2 win. Alas for the Canaries, their song of defiance was in vain, as Sunderland’s 3-0 win over Everton condemned both themselves and the Wearside club’s perennial local rivals Newcastle United to the drop.

In the past, Smith’s recommendations of types of food or kitchen equipment have sent sales soaring in what has come to be known as the “Delia Effect.” Sadly for her, no such Effect obtains in the world of football.

After this season’s extraordinary drama at the top of the Premier League, where 5000-1 outsiders Leicester City doggedly succeeded in turning fantasy into reality by taking the title, the struggle at the other end of the table provided a grimly fascinating spectacle. All told, it was a particularly refreshing year for the Premier League brand.

Norwich were one of the original members of the first Premier League in 1992-93, but they have now been relegated four times – thus equalling the record previously held by Crystal Palace.

With Aston Villa long doomed, only Arsenal, Chelsea, Everton, Liverpool, Manchester United and Spurs are Premier League ever-presents.

Much has been made at this time of the season of the “magic marker” of 40 points – oft quoted by managers of threatened teams as being the total required to guarantee safety since the Premier League switched from 42 to 38 matches in 1995-96.

The statistics show this is broadly, but not universally, true. In 1996-97 and 1997-98, a total of 40 points was not enough to prevent Sunderland and Bolton respectively from going down. Indeed, in 2002-03 West Ham went down despite gathering 42 points.

Seven years later West Ham made another mark on Premier League history as they stayed up with just 35 points, matching the effort of Hull the season before.

Sunderland may be celebrating right now, but the club is almost as well acquainted with relegation from the top flight as Norwich and Palace, having gone down three times – and on two occasions with the record fewest points - 19 in 2002-03, 15 in 2005-06. Thankfully for the Wearsiders, Derby County took up that unwanted distinction in 2008 when they were relegated with just 11 points.

So much for the statistics. The Norwich players, applauded off the field by their fans, are now getting their heads around another season in the Championship. Smith and Co have problems to solve in the boardroom following the sudden resignation of the club’s chief executive, David McNally.

But, like one of Delia’s souffles, Norwich City will surely rise again…