Everton’s new dawn breaks on Saturday when Marco Silva gets to see his charges in action for the first time.
It has been two months since Sam Allardyce ended his Everton tenure with a dismal 3-1 away loss at West Ham.
Despite how miraculous a job some of the media feel he did at Goodison Park, it’s far from the truth.
Now the focus is on new management, Silva and Marcel Brands, who have been casting an eye over the squad at a training camp in Austria.
With four weeks to the big kick at Wolves the blues begin the race for match fitness with a clash against Alpine minnows Irdning.
The fixture will take place at Irdning’s home stadium, ATV Riesnerlam, a venue that has been used in the past by both England and Real Madrid for training.
Irdning compete in the Oberliga Nord League and finished 11th out of 14 last term.
Pre-season fixtures don’t revolve around results. Of course it is always nice to go into the new campaign with a bit of winning momentum, but the main premise is to gain much needed fitness.
Team news
Everton took a full squad of players to Austria, with the exceptions of the Toffees’ World Cup stars, Jordan Pickford, Gylfi Sigurdsson and Idrissa Gueye.
Silva has also brought taken a number of youth players including Antonee Robinson, Callum Connolly and Kieran Dowell.
Sandro Ramirez, Kevin Mirallas and Mohammed Besic are back at the club and are ready to take part despite uncertainty regarding their futures.