Everton 2 Sunderland 1 – Curly Hair too Sunderland one
How much better is that? After an outstanding performance last week which yielded just one point, yesterday the Blues dug in and managed to do (just) enough to get three.
With twenty minutes to go things were looking bleak but this grand old team of ours has quite a few qualities, steely determination is certainly one of them.
The first half was pretty even really, with Everton having more of the ball but Sunderland making the better chances. Quite a decent side Sunderland really, with the likes of Johnson, Fletcher and Sessignon. There was a chance to try the much overused punditry style right there…yer Johnsons, yer Fletchers and yer Sessignons just then, but it was skilfully avoided as it’s hugely annoying. They also had a poppy free James Maclean, must be some kind of Celtic/Rangers thing?
Where were we? Oh yeah, quite decent Sunderland.
For the Blues it wasn’t really happening in the first half. Pienaar, almost certainly linked to his new do, looked a little out of sorts yesterday. Too many long balls when it’s his short passing and trickery that make him such an asset. And that’s despite his new barnet potentially playing a part (Carsley/Gravesen to Real style) in Leon’s England call up. Everton were good at retaining possession but finding it really hard to carve out any meaningful chances against resolute opposition.
The main spark of creativity was coming from the be-gloved Kevin Mirallas, who seems happy to hold on to the ball, sometimes running crossfield, in order to make chances, interchanging frequently with Pienaar. This may have an impact on Seamus, who was exposed on a couple of occasions as first Sessignon and then Fletcher (who looked pretty hesitant for a decent striker) failed to score when bearing down on Tim Howard.
Everton’s plight looked worse when the gloves quite literally came off as Mirallas limped off, possibly hamstrung. This gave another chance to the busy Steven Naismith. It’s really irritating when you’re faced with someone who has a lookalike but you can’t quite put your finger on who it is. Got it with Naismith though. It’s a slightly chunkier, slightly narkier looking Les Dennis.
Our best first-half effort probably came from a free-kick, caused by one of them mad Seamus Riverdance runs. Baines squared to Jela, who with an improvised effort nearly hit the target. Worked hard yesterday did Nikica, good to see.
As the first half meandered to a close, Neville actually accepted the invite to shooooot and did so to reasonable effect. Next, Sunderland scored. Leon ‘switched off’ for a second and that was enough for Johnson, his fellow number 21, to get in and finish well. Cue a few comedy boos and much gloom and doom for Evertonians.
A wise blue pointed out that Everton only really score at the Street End in the Leauge this season, Baines v Newcastle being the only exception, but after 70 minutes it was looking grim. The closest we came was a couple of Johnny Heitinga headers, one cleared comfortably off the line and the other badly miscued. Jagielka’s form, he was rock solid again yesterday, suggests that it has to be him plus Johnny or Syl, but you do lose a bit in the opposing box when the big Frenchman is missing.
Moyes, who gets criticised for not making subs soon enough, brought on Vellios for Neville, who’s been pretty decent in recent weeks. When Gibson comes back into the side it’ll be very interesting to see whether Neville reverts to the bench our gets in ahead of Seamus.
This also saw the entrance of ‘King’ Louis who quite rightly got a good reception. Tolos’ introduction meant that Fellaini dropped back into midfield although he still played in a pretty advanced position. Potential masterstroke from Moyesy there, Vellios occupied Cuellar and O’Shea, leaving space for Fellaini. And when he got the ball in such a position, he drilled a great shot hard and low into the corner. The ball had make its way through a few pairs of legs, but thems the breaks. Back to the Semus v Neville debate, Coleman was actually Everton’s furthest forward player during that move, occupying a couple of defenders to create space for the Big Fella. Maybe, just maybe, if we are going to be a top 6 side that’s why he has to get the nod ahead of Neville’s superior nous and positioning.
There was just time for Saha to get caught offside on the exact same blade of grass as he had many times in the past before the big man struck again. Another ball into his feet, from Leon once again, this time a brilliant flick which somehow made it through John O’Shea’s legs. When you watch the TV replay it looks like it’s going to hit him every time, but somehow sneaks through. Jela, from memory very much like he did at Wembley, (never seen it on TV) simply passed it into the opposite corner with the inside of his right foot. The next touch was indeed the celebration. Beautiful. Apparently that maintains his record of never having gone more than 3 games without bagging for the Blues. Nice.
Everton’s somewhat dodgy defence was nearly breached straight after when Louis won a far post header to set up Cuellar. Luckily for us, Gardner, who has been a thorn in the Blues side in the past, blocked his effort right in front of a Belgium flag in the Park End.
Not too much happened after that. Vellios was pretty energetic and had some neat touches, looking the part. Sunderland threw on Conor Wickham, who is absolutely massive by the way, but to no great effect. Oh and Der Hammer came on and misplaced a pass and had an awful shot. More Mallet’s Mallet (ask yer dad) on this occasion. Danny Rose was blocked off by Fellaini and just to confirm to Sunderland and their fans that this wasn’t their day, was penalised and then booked. Ah well.
Despite conceding first for the SIXTH time in a row, once again Everton held firm and ended the run of draws with a crucial win. If we could keep the winning run going through November then the tough tests which await us in December can be faced with more confidence.
We rode our luck a little, against the Black Cats of all people, but who cares? A win is a win is a win.
Nice one Blues.
Everton 1 Blackburn 1 – Blues advised not to count relegation chickens
Another grim old day at Goodison saw the Blues spend long periods, once again, being outplayed by a team deemed by most to be in grave danger of relegation. Without doubt, this is the most moribund (copyright Alan Partridge) home campaign during the Moyes reign and attendances, atmosphere and apathy are all directly derived from this irrefutable fact.
On to the action.
Everton started with (big) Victor replacing Drenthe and Rovers went into the game without both Yakubu and Samba. We saw a first league home start for Duffy and Gibson, along with a second home league start in his second spell for Donovan. All three were pretty conspicuous during what followed, more on them in a bit.
The Toffees started pretty slowly with Blackburn playing the neater football and the home side really struggling to piece things together. Victor did have an early chance to no avail but Rovers were looking like a side with many of the facets we seem to lack at the moment; youth, cohesion, pace, confidence and all those kind of necessary things. Dunn was pulling the strings in midfield (Gibson and Fellaini relatively anonymous) and it wasn’t long before Blackburn had a really close thing in front of an already depressed Park End.
Duffy misjudged a far-post corner, allowing Dann to head back across before a desperate combination of Neville, Baines and post/bar kept it out.
The first half meandered on with the home side showing some signs of coming into it but once again our main focus was working the ball wide and feeding in crosses. That can work to an extent, Vic and Landon were having some joy, but we haven’t got the players to be incisive and go through the middle. Blackburn did and Bolton have (Mark Davies showed this pleasingly last night) but we don’t. The main reason for this is that Saha is looking totally off-form right now. For our ‘game plan’ to work, he needs to be a threat down the middle – he isn’t and we’re not. Anyway, then something weird happened. Like really weird.
We scored in the first half. I know. Tim Cahill finally notched and we got a major break from a referee. Great stuff. Everton worked a decent opportunity from Neville, it looked like the chance had gone but good work from Anichebe, Baines and Donovan left Felli and Cahill bearing down on Robinson. Good hands from the Belgian and Tim scored and gave the corner flag a couple of taps. At last. Hopefully, part of his preparation for scoring against his favourite opponents (City) next week.
Just after that, we had an excellent move down the right, passing at pace, taking some risks (rather than the safe pass all the time). Sadly Cahill’s eye-catching reverse ball was blazed over by Donovan. Then, our young centre-half did well to block a shot which ran kindly to Dunn, who hit the post and Everton smuggled it away. It was relief for The Blues when the half-time whistle came and it was to be hoped that we would come out the stronger and leave the relegation haunted visitors to bemoan their bad luck.
Humour is in short supply at the Old Lady right now, but the first half was improved by one wag’s response to the ‘There’s only one Jack Walker’ chants coming from the away fans.
‘Fucking dig him up then’. Nice.
The second half followed a similar pattern to the first although Everton were starting to exercise a bit more control, Fellaini trying to assert himself in a crowded midfield. There weren’t really many chances in what became an increasingly scrappy game, Moyesy trying to improve things with the introduction of Drenthe, whilst Blackburn replaced Dunn who excelled himself by lasting a full hour at Goodison.
Based on the fact that Everton only score one goal per game typically (November and Bolton away was the last league game we got two), something had to give and typically, it did. Howard, who has been excellent recently, made a mess of a long ball from perennial pain in the arse Morten ‘The Gamster’ Pedersen and in a typical 2011/12 moment, Cahill (desperately doing the right thing by covering his keeper) booted the ball against Goodwillie and it went it. It’s been a while since we’ve heard one of them Street End ‘gasps of horror’, but there was one there yesterday for defo.
In fact, Goodison has an apocalyptic feel about it right now. The bleak atmosphere and general feeling of dread is matched totally by the ‘end of the world’ style weather. Even our newest structure (the Park End) moans and groans at the pure pain of being there. You can imagine the Four Horsemen looking on, with Death saying to Pestilence ‘Has Hibbert scored yet?’
The equaliser created a sense of urgency and Everton went straight down the other end, only for Captain Phil to celebrate his 35th by getting dog’s abuse for accidentally slipping when set to cross. Moysey introduced our ‘IMF boys’ – Vellios and Denis. We reverted to long-ball and in all honesty could easily have pinched the three points. Duffy hit the bar with a great effort and Denis showed what he can do. And what he can do is this. Combine a complete lack of skill on the floor with working his balls off and winning every flick on available. He’s the king of the flick on. His first touch was a flick on. Where are useful ‘Opta stats’ when you need em?
The closing stages saw a decent save from Robinson to deny Fellaini and then a mad scramble with close things from Felliani and Denis. Injury time Goodison winners have been a trademark of the Moyes reign, but it just ain’t happening in 2011/12.
As promised, a look at Landon, Darron and Shane.
Duffy had a decent game, looking athletic and decisive and happy to at least try to play the ball out of defence. There’s definitely potential there and coming into a team without much confidence, he should be pretty chuffed with his display.
As for Landon, his game was very patchy, firing over when he should have scored in the first half, but at least trying to play the game at pace and do the right things. The (shades of NFL) throw from Howard to him in the first half was excellent, showing signs that we could actually do things on the break. Our goal last week also came from this source. Definitely an asset right now.
Gibson was OK but not really influential in the game. It is probably a bit harsh to say he didn’t really look fit (he’s probably pretty one-paced anyway) based on how little first team action he’s had. There were times when he showed he was a player and also times when you can see why a 37 year old would be brought out of retirement. The main issue looking forward is that Fellaini is at his best when anchoring the midfield and Gibson’s positioning seemed to get in his way. Too early to say whether he’ll work in there but currently hard to see how he would be a preferable option to a fit Rodwell or Osman.
So there we have it, another disappointing day at Goodison.
Eight points off the relegation zone seems relatively comfortable, but 14th place is an accurate reflection of our season so far. With QPR, Bolton and Blackburn all on the (up and) up, and our striking resources (with Saha out of sorts) looking inferior to any other team in the League, (and many outside like Leicester or Huddersfield) it won’t be easy.
Forget Nil Satis Nisi Optimum for now, survival is the key.
Blackburn Preview: Everton Kean on licking the Rovers
This is the beginning of a run of three games at Goodison for the Mighty Blues which could play a decisive role in the direction of our season. Most Evertonians would probably take four league points and cup progress as an excellent outcome, with a point against City seen as a decent return. From a league point of view three points from Blackburn is imperative. Goodison hasn’t been a happy home for the Blues this season with only three league wins. The last time we hosted an old-fashioned Lancashire derby, against Bolton a couple of weeks back, we turned in one of our worst performances in many a year.
Moyesy has asked for Goodison to get behind the players and drive them on during this run. Probably a polite way of saying it’s been like a morgue on occasions this season. The gloom surrounding the off-field issues has dampened supporters’ expectations and led to an over-riding frustration watching games at the Old Lady. This match brings along the one Premier League club whose supporters have been more angry and despairing than ours. They’ve had more demos than us – last week’s 24-hour protest outside Ewood Park being the latest. They’ve also been more vociferous inside the ground too. Most of that has been directed at owners Venky’s and the living embodiment of all things bad about the Rovers’ situation – Steve Kean
Moyesy does get some stick – he can frustrate with his conservatism at times – but the vast majority of Goodison is with him and recognises the constraints he’s working under. It tends to be on the internet and message boards he gets some Steve Kean treatment. Neither manager has had the proper backing of their boards, for different reasons. From a distance – don’t claim any expertise on Blackburn’s inner workings – it seems that Kean is the lonely figurehead who is bearing the brunt of all the anger. The Venky’s have dismantled the boardroom at Ewood and gutted the management structure of a well-regarded and previously well-run club. The workings of agent Jerome Anderson with the club are also unclear. The local press in Blackburn have highlighted a letter sent to Venky’s last January outlining the concerns of the then board members. Very prescient as it turns out. It looks like Kean reports directly to Mrs Desai in India and is alleged to travel there once a month to do so. Probably could do with investing in a video conference facility if they’re having money problems…Whatever they thought they were doing when they bought the club – raising their profile? – it’s not working out and they seem out of their depth. They might be ace at selling chickens but Steve Kean is often left looking like a freshly-plucked piece of fowl on the touchline as he gets stick from all corners.
His record isn’t very good and some clubs would’ve had him out by now – QPR spring to mind. Whilst we mention them, see Joey Barton is sticking the knife into Neil Warnock big time. “If I talked about Neil, he’d do well to get another job”, among other megalomaniacal quotes. Warnock is only the one who bought him and made him club captain earlier this season…Neither are pleasant characters – the best thing about Barton is his commitment to good spelling and grammar on twitter – so balls to both of them. Neither Everton or Blackburn seem to have any plumbs like Joey disrupting things.
Meanwhile, the Everton Chief Exec, Robert Elstone, released a candid blog on the club’s finances last week. It was a good response to the ‘where’s all the money gone?’ questions. He gave an assessment of the last five seasons and how new contracts to players, matchday income, etc all combine to mean we’re skint. Yes Bob, but why did you have to ruin it when talking about dropping gate revenues this season with “…rumours of the sabotage of ticket sales, programmes and other matchday income”. It’s clear neither he, nor Bill Kenwright, have any truck with the Blue Union, especially after the taping incident earlier this season. They seem to have a bunker mentality to any criticism. Well, times are hard, the team isn’t doing that well, we’re not exactly seeing sexy football at Goodison, so it’s not a big surprise gates are down. All Evertonians are concerned with what’s going on – if we can’t replace aging players, what does the future hold? Elstone and Kenwright should take the blinkers off and engage with all Evertonians – they can’t afford not to – as the search for new investment, or a new way of running things at Goodison continues. Kenwright is the boardroom figurehead at all the games which Rovers don’t have.
Rovers have had a slight upturn in recent weeks and last week’s win against Fulham with 10 men – interesting that the fans got behind the team on the back of a referee’s decision and they responded with a great win – means they’ll roll up with some confidence. Everton too, on the back of a more encouraging performance at Villa last week, can have a bit of optimism. We’ve not got any of our recently injured players back but the chance to see what Darron Gibson can offer the Goodison gallery intrigues. Landon Donovan, who had an excellent game at Villa – more through balls please lid – can hopefully inspire a much-needed home win.
Moyesy’s comments about nursing Big Vic back suggest he may start on the bench again. If nursing back means he’s a goalscoring super sub then we can live with that. Vellios boosted himself with a hat-trick against Rovers in the Reserves 4-2 win on Monday. An interesting comment from Alan Stubbs in the Echo after that when he said Vellios played for the team rather than himself – maybe explaining a bit why he’s gone off Moyesy’s radar recently. Joes Baxter slotted one and played well too, so expect Jose to be on the bench against Rovers. In the unlikely event of Denis starting, it looks like Saha up front again. Come on Louis, give us a goal.
At least the Yak won’t be proving the immutable law of the ex…but there weren’t many Evertonians who didn’t want rid of him in the summer. Not fit, not scoring goals and the chance to get some money for him meant his move was welcomed in most quarters. Well, the big lad has done great for Rovers since he’s been there. It’s the other end where they’ve had big problems. It’s uncertain whether big Chris Samba will play against us – transfer request and all. As long as he doesn’t do a Gary Cahill and slot on his last appearance.
Here’s hoping the Toffees can notch one early – remember those first half goals? – and ease ourselves to a comfortable win. If not, we may need Moyesy’s substitutions to work their wonders again. In all the despair this season, Moyey’s subs have been the one bright spot. There’s always someone with the ‘Change it Moyes’ but he has handled that bit well and we’ve scored more goals by subs than anyone.
So then, up the Toffees.
Fulham 1 Everton 3: Three Cottage Cheese for the Blues
Games are coming thick and fast at the moment – some thoughts on the Fulham match before we concentrate on the Chelsea and Man Utd games. On a day when most of the nation was looking elsewhere, the Toffees ended their run of three live TV games, and three defeats, with a late show against Maarten Cornelis Jol’s Fulham – it’s only a pity it’s not still Leslie Mark Hughes’ Fulham – to give us a lift going into this challenging week. Typical Everton as all eyes were elsewhere, we played our part in an entertaining game and, ultimately, a great win.
Moyesy needed to shake things up – we’ve all had our say on that – he gave full league debuts to Royston Ricky Drenthe and Tolos Vellios and brought back Neville with Cahill, Coleman and Saha making way. Interestingly all three fresh starters were used subs against Chelsea and all three dropped players came on as subs in this one. Probably shows how much Bily and Johnny Heitinga are out of favour at the moment. Never mind El Traca himself – his new nickname will be El Trackie if he doesn’t get any game time soon.
A bright start for the Blues paid off with Big Felli robbing Murphy to win possession and, after some interplay, the ball broke to Drenthe who ran onto it and curled a powerful shot in from about 30 yards. It was a sweet finish demonstrating the Dutchman’s technical ability. He ran over to the bench to share his joy. It seems like he’s a positive character to have around – at the moment anyway – and his overall performance, including getting an assist for Saha’s goal, means we should be seeing a bit more of him.
Tolos, too, gave a decent account of himself against the likes of Hangeland for 50 minutes. He will be disappointed not to have scored when getting his head onto a Hibbo cross. It was possibly a bit too high for him but it’s the type of goal he should be getting regularly if he carries on progressing. Whether Moyes has given him his chance for the time being and will now revert back to nurturing him from the bench – his post-match comments suggest as much – will be interesting as the Blues search for a regular threat up front.
Clean sheets are still a problem too, although the Fulham equaliser was a sweet chip from Ruiz. Howard had been called on to preserve our lead in the first half with some decisive keeping. The best moment was when he headed away a Danny Murphy shot. A backheader from a rebound off the post which Jags would’ve been proud of – Jags would’ve put it into his own net, no doubt. Howard redeeming himself after a hesitant display against Chelsea last week was good to see. Defence isn’t just about the back four and keeper though. A bit of lazy play by Fellaini as he didn’t work hard enough to rescue, or challenge for, an admittedly poor ball to him, nearly cost us. Andy ‘Andrew’ Johnson easily passed the Belgian and slotted in Bobby ‘Z-Cars’ Zamora, who should’ve won it for Fulham with only a minute or so of normal time left. You’ve probably seen it – a bit of a Torres / Rosenthal moment at the time – but he couldn’t roll it into an empty net as he will have seen Jags standing in front of him just about on the line and Hibbo was mistiming a lunge on the periphery of his vision – luckily he was nowhere near giving a penalty away. So, Zamora had a slight challenge but, let’s face it, he should’ve scored and won the game for them. His head was in his hands as Howard snotted it downfield and Drenthe did well to nod it into Saha’s path. Louis showed what he can do with a nicely poked finish to send Evertonians wild. It wasn’t long before Drenthe earned a free kick on the left and Baines’ cross was only partially cleared to Rodwell who banged in a nice finish.
A happy day for the Toffees making the long journey home a bit easier. A good win which moves us up the table and creates a bit of distance from the North West enclave that is the bottom three. Things are still tight but this shows we have still got a bit about us. If Felli and Rodwell can exert themselves in midfield – they’re capable of it – and we have the likes of Drenthe with a bit of skill and devil (a la Pienaar?) and Louis finds his form then we can have a few more days like this one.
Ian Marshall's Matters 
Stoke 1 Everton 1 – Another case of ifs and butts
Another draw in the story of our season, refs missing important stuff, Everton missing presentable chances and playing some good football, lapses at the back throwing points away.
Stoke’s style and home form means that a lot of teams will be happy with a point from the Brittania, but for the umpteenth time this season, The Blues could have taken all three. But let’s talk about the Fellaini thing first.
Having been out of sorts against Spurs (Vellios seemed to win as many flick-ons in his few minutes on the pitch), Fellaini didn’t have the best of games yesterday. He is a player who gets easily wound up and obviously comes in for a lot of attention from opponents. But that in no way serves to excuse what he did yesterday. Not because he butted (and apparently punched and elbowed) Shawcross, most people would probably like to do that, but because of the impact it could have on the team.
He’ll be looking at a three game ban as an absolute minimum – so if this fictitious transfer goes through at the start of January, he’ll have played his last game for Everton. That won’t happen of course. The nightmare scenario is that the FA decide to go all ‘Big Dunc’ on him and give him four or even six. He has apparently apologised and Moyesy was quick to accept what happened – which may be viewed in a positive light by ‘the man’. Let’s hope so.
You did get the sense that Moyes was sincere in his condemnation (rather than using it as a cynical attempt to curry favour) and it is to his credit that he did so. No tantrums, no conspiracy theories, no defence of the indefensible and no definitely no t-shirts – despite the Belgian making a far more interesting silhouette than the goofy Uruguayan.
As for the rest of the game, it’s a classic case of the 2012 EFC vintage.
Team news wise, the starting eleven was exactly as expected but there was a surprise on the bench when it appeared Andy ‘the gully’ Townsend’s favourite player Magy Gueye was on there ahead of Oviedo. This was quickly cleared up as a mistake (it would have been) and Costa Rican ‘hottie’ Bryan was restored.
We started well, quickly attempting to establish ourselves against a doughty Stoke team, who have an uncanny similarity to an EDL Christmas Party, with a surprise invite for Kenwynne Jones. As ever, Baines and Pienaar combined well and The Blues had (yet another) decent penalty claim turned down. Pienaar’s cross hit Whitehead(?) on the arm….and we didn’t get a what Chris Waddle would call a pelanty. Those sort of things shouldn’t really be pens, but increasingly refs give them, alas Mark Halsey chose not to.
Stoke were huffing and indeed puffing to no great effect at this stage and Everton created another chance when Gibson’s pass was deflected through to Jelavic, who missed his kick, allowing Naismith to lift it over the keeper. Shawcross, who is a pretty handy centre-half, cleared well.
Strange little player is Naismith but he’s earning a grudging respect (it takes time to forgive him for that miss at Elland Road). We do lack goals from midfield and he has that great knack of popping up in the right place at the right time. Mirallas’ being missing means he’ll get an extended run in the side – hopefully he’ll chip in with a few goals.
Soon after that Shawcross gifted The Blues the lead. Nice one. After the Spurs game, thinking mainly about Sigurdsson hitting the bar at 1-0, maybe our luck was turning after all.
Arguably the most significant moment of the game (apart from Fellaini) came just before half-time. Baines, sporting a Bradley Wiggins look these days, latched on to a pass from his South African team-mate (his Chris Froome maybe?) and pulled back a perfect ball for Leon on the penalty spot. Ossie seemed to aim for the wrong corner and screwed wide. You just knew we’d regret that.
Half-time came, Steve Round presumably told one his Ronnie Corbett style jokes and bored everyone sh1tless and for the millionth time Everton started the second half slowly.
The equalizer was massively frustrating. Shawcross played a long ball in, Jones generated decent power and placed his header towards the bottom corner, where Howard dived and saved relatively comfortably. Only Tim never dived and not for the first time this season, cost us a goal. He’s made some great saves this season (he made a decent one later from Jones) but too many costly errors. Maybe, he’s another reason why we are not quite top four material.
So just like New Year’s Day 2011, the scorers were own goal and Kenwynne Jones.
Jones also hit the post and the game had completely turned around and Everton were looking rattled.
Moyes brought on Ross Barkley for Naismith who looked assured and tidy in possession. The other noticeable thing was that he looked a bit trimmer than previously. Hopefully a good sign. With Fellaini out, there could be a key role for Ross to play in the coming weeks – just maybe the timing will be perfect for him.
The game ended with another squandered opportunity. After a great run, Pienaar showed us the one thing we all know is missing from his game, he just can’t shoot. It’s weird, a player who makes so many good decisions around the pitch, tends to make the wrong ones in front of goal.
So there we have it – another point.
The missed chances and our inability to finish teams off (plus our slow starts to the second half) make it hard to resist the conclusion that we are not quite good enough to finish top four.
Hope that’s wrong like.