Everton v QPR. 15th Dec at 20.00.

[Joey66]

Tonight it was a good result - a balanced team - one complaint was the substitution of Aidan McGeedy for SP who looked as useless as on Thursday night - SP is now so slow - I feel he has lost the plot - he gave the ball away, and mis - passed it with every touch - He has been a very good player, but looks well finished imo - Barkley , and Besic were brilliant tonight - a very good team effort, and a much need win - we had the pace tonight - both in the middle and on the flanks - our tempo fetched the goals! No tippy tappy slow football naismith was also great to be back showing how we have missed him!

 

[bluemangroup]

Tonight it was a good result - a balanced team - one complaint was the substitution of Aidan McGeedy for SP who looked as useless as on Thursday night - SP is now so slow - I feel he has lost the plot - he gave the ball away, and mis - passed it with every touch - He has been a very good player, but looks well finished imo - Barkley , and Besic were brilliant tonight - a very good team effort, and a much need win - we had the pace tonight - both in the middle and on the flanks - our tempo fetched the goals! No tippy tappy slow football naismith was also great to be back showing how we have missed him!

10 minutes at the end having not played in god knows how long for the first team and he's definitely definitely finished? OK M8

 

[Joey66]

10 minutes at the end having not played in god knows how long for the first team and he's definitely definitely finished? OK M8

SP played on Thursday, and looked poor then!

 

[bluemangroup]

SP played on Thursday, and looked poor then!

Not first team is it?

 

[LAToffee]

Not pretty but looking better. We are clearly missing urgency. There's no pressing and only Barkley seems to be interested in moving the ball at pace. I just don't understand why Martinez hasn't been able to get the team up to tempo yet. Throughout the season we've allowed teams to get 10 men behind ball before we've even thought of going past the half-way line. It makes the team look lackadaisical which we all know isn't our style.

Also what was up with keeping Mirallas on for so long? He was bagged after 60 minutes. If he wasn't going to get karate kicked by Mutch, then he was going to pull a hamstring. Martinez's substitutions are just so different from last season.

Agreed. Everyone can see this (including, I suspect, Bobby). When they move at speed, teams crack. But if he knows we need to move the ball quicker, he needs to be working on that on the training ground. I see the ball heading back to Howard far too much. The really annoying one was a free kick well in their half that we contrived to turn into serious pressure on our goal. He's got to correct this. We would have been beat by a better team tonight. Well off our best last season.

 

[riddick]

Agreed. Everyone can see this (including, I suspect, Bobby). When they move at speed, teams crack. But if he knows we need to move the ball quicker, he needs to be working on that on the training ground. I see the ball heading back to Howard far too much. The really annoying one was a free kick well in their half that we contrived to turn into serious pressure on our goal. He's got to correct this. We would have been beat by a better team tonight. Well off our best last season.

Which, i think, was the reasoning for the boo'ing tonight at the end. Its just so peculiarly different than last season. We had Gerard, sure, but anytime we break, the ball almost invariably winds back up with one of the back 4 near the halfway line and, way too often, even back with Howard. Its so frustrating, it has to be something he's told them to do because i cant imagine thats how they want to play.

 

[Khalekan]

This has probably been mentioned but the Goodison crowd was embarrassing to boo a player, no need lads.

They weren't booing a player per se.....they were booing an increasing tendency among our team to go backwards with the ball when we are in the opposition half.

I wasn't there tonight as I am laid up with a chest infection, but I heard the booing on TV and it was extraordinary to hear people booing when we were 3-0 up.

There seems to be a growing disenchantment with certain aspects of our play and the Goodison faithful aren't shy about letting the powers that me know it.

In the old days when I first started going in the early 70s, there used to be cushions on the stand seats and after a bad performance we would be in the Street watching thousands of these cushions sailing through the air from the Top Balcony like frisbees and land on the pitch

That was how the arl boys in the stands registered their dissatisfaction back then.

 

[RFUS]

As for Lukaku and his age.
Yes, he is just 21. But the worrying thing is that he played much better when he was 19 and 20 then now.

Not a fair comparison though. It's a lot easier coming off the bench and having the manager play to your strengths. Bobby is clearly trying to mould him into a fearsome, well-rounded lone striker; a Belgian Drogba.

However his current strength is playing with his back not to goal, but rather facing the goal and bearing down with his pace and strength, then slotting. The dilemma is whether we persist shaping him into the player he isn't currently, or whether we adapt and play to his strengths.

Both are reasonable in my opinion; in the case of the former he has already shown small improvements (better first touch etc) and that indicates that he might be able to perfect the role in time. In the case of the latter, making your £28m record signing the player you base your team around kind of makes sense too.

 

[Khalekan]

I read a good article somewhere else which was calling for patience towards Bobby's style of play and I totally agreed with it. When watching tonight and hearing the booing of decisions to play the ball back - what's wrong with starting again if there are no options at that time

I'll tell you what's wrong with it......it invites the other team on to you when you have most of your men deployed in forward positions.

At it's most idiotic extreme it leads to the second goal we conceeded at Spurs.....Seamus had the ball on the edge of their box in first half injury time and proceeded to play the ball back....and It kept going back until it was passed forward to Barry.

You know what happened next.

There is never "not an option" when you are encamped around the opposition box.

If you play it all the way back in order to start again you generally find yourself back in the position you were in when you started playing it back.

If there appears nowt on.....then bang it in the middle rather than head back to your own goal.

Because you never know what can come of it.

Those three goals tonight all came about when the ball deflected off've players......that's what can happen when fortune favours the brave.

Imagine Ross had said....."ah, sod it....there is nowt on here so I will stop, turn round and play the ball back to Jags"

No.....he had a rattle and scored a spectacular goal.

There is only one thing certain in "possession" football.......it is impossible to keep the ball all the time

Ergo you are going to lose possession many times during a match.

IMO it is way better losing it as far up the field as possible

 

[slimspek]

Agreed. Everyone can see this (including, I suspect, Bobby). When they move at speed, teams crack. But if he knows we need to move the ball quicker, he needs to be working on that on the training ground. I see the ball heading back to Howard far too much. The really annoying one was a free kick well in their half that we contrived to turn into serious pressure on our goal. He's got to correct this. We would have been beat by a better team tonight. Well off our best last season.

Which, i think, was the reasoning for the boo'ing tonight at the end. Its just so peculiarly different than last season. We had Gerard, sure, but anytime we break, the ball almost invariably winds back up with one of the back 4 near the halfway line and, way too often, even back with Howard. Its so frustrating, it has to be something he's told them to do because i cant imagine thats how they want to play.

They weren't booing a player per se.....they were booing an increasing tendency among our team to go backwards with the ball when we are in the opposition half.

I wasn't there tonight as I am laid up with a chest infection, but I heard the booing on TV and it was extraordinary to hear people booing when we were 3-0 up.

There seems to be a growing disenchantment with certain aspects of our play and the Goodison faithful aren't shy about letting the powers that me know it.

In the old days when I first started going in the early 70s, there used to be cushions on the stand seats and after a bad performance we would be in the Street watching thousands of these cushions sailing through the air from the Top Balcony like frisbees and land on the pitch

That was how the arl boys in the stands registered their dissatisfaction back then.

Agree with all of this.

What really gets me is that all this deliberately lethargic and overly cautious passing is the wrong decision most of the time. The prime exampled being that bizarre free kick which was taken short but only ended up going towards our goal, there was absolutely no reason for that decision. I could understand slowing the tempo and playing the ball back when opponents have the upper hand but that isn't happening, teams are content to sit back and not press us because they know we won't do anything. The right decision would be to take one less touch, to make that risky pass or dribble forward. Just absolutely bizarre decision making by Martinez and the players.

I don't support booing players or individuals but I felt the booing was justified when it was aimed at the back passes and lethargy. The team has take the compliments AND the criticisms.

 

[chicoazul]

Well I suppose being right 100% of the time is a factor in my mindest.

Its a curse.

I dunno how some people do it tho, my head would explode if I was as negative as some.

You've proven time after time on here that you're not only the fattest poster but the most clueless too.

 

[Goat]

You've proven time after time on here that you're not only the fattest poster but the most clueless too.

No Friend.

 

[chicoazul]

No Friend.

Just let me have my moment yo.

 

[ilikecheese]

You know what...Barkley playing deeper looked darn good. His goal was set up because he can beat a pressing defender and get around them with relative ease. We struggle against the press because we don't have a lot of players that have that skill. He's so dangerous running at teams with the ball in his feet.

 

[JP McMurphy]

More tempo and more urgency. take of Mc Geady. pienaar on the left mirallas on the right

i aint going to bang on about the performance because i have seen spurs, united and arsenal play several times this season and more often than not they've been winning games they've been battered in and deserved nothing. it was about time we had luck nearly on their level.

then our best player goes and gets injured again.

More urgency - Pienaar??? He misplaced almost every pass, lost the ball several times and done nothing of any note.
Mirallas, our best player? He goes on headless runs looking for glory, completely ignores his team mates, then refuses to do any defensive work; watch how he allows their free kick to be taken while he moans at the linesman, then, while Zamora taps in their goal, you can see Mirallas, just standing by the halfway line, having admired the QPR attack. . which he made no attempt to affect. Cut back prior to the substitution and the much-maligned McGeady chases back with their left back each time. Mirallas is so over rated (especially by himself) that if he carries out his threat to leave, I reckon that will be the end of his first team career.
And the problem of the CH's not being able to bring the ball out can be solved immediately by bringing the now fit Stones with Alcaraz in for the limited and nervous J & D