Even if we'd been firing on all cylinders, Southampton, Swansea, Stoke and presumably Palace have recorded their highest-ever Premier League points tallies and Europa League qualification would have been an achievement. Given the start that we had, we've done very well to overtake West Ham.
I saw a table of teams who had shot themselves in the foot the most often and we topped it. We need to stop giving away sloppy goals. We haven't been able to play our preferred back five of Howard, Coleman, Stones, Jagielka and Baines on too many occasions though and McCarthy has been missing too. We've seen in glimpses that we can be mean at the back.
And Roberto has the same issues as Moyes when it comes to breaking down teams who park the bus at Goodison. Hopefully the playmaker that Martinez is looking for can help to remedy that.
I applaud his courage in handing Galloway a debut. I think we'd all like to see Garbutt stay but, if he's intent on leaving, it shows him that he's not irreplaceable. We're going to need a senior left-sided centre back and I think they're fairly thin on the ground. I think that Dragovic from Dynamo Kiev can use both feet and his aerial prowess would help to compensate for the loss of Distin and Alcaraz. Otherwise, we're well-stocked in defence.
I'd expect this to be Barry's last season. I think that Barkley will drop in beside McCarthy anyway and break forward from a deeper position. Fingers crossed that we can find someone cute to play in behind Lukaku and feed our forwards. Ross and Mirallas are both too selfish for that role. We'll quite likely keep Lennon to play on the right. That could mean that Mirallas moves to the left to cut in on his favoured right foot. I'd expect us to bring in a loanee winger of the calibre of Deulofeu or Atsu. Maybe Andre Ayew on a bosman could be the answer? And that I think that Pienaar, Osman and McGeady are capable of game-changing cameos. If we add Cleverley to the ranks as well, we'll have good competition for places.
Roberto did say that he wasn't looking for another forward but since then I've read another quote where he said that he doesn't want Lukaku to take his place for granted. I'd expect that the majority of his transfer funds are reserved for securing a quality playmaker and that he's happy to sacrifice adding to the forwards to that end. We'd have to be interested in Austin for £10m. We'd then have plenty of cover with Kone, Naismith and Mirallas.
Howard
Coleman Stones Jagielka Baines
McCarthy Barkley
Lennon Playmaker Mirallas
Lukaku
That lineup looks stronger already. It takes time to build a team and I think that we're stronger with every window. If we can find that player who makes everything tick it will raise Lukaku to a whole new level, and he's already a 20 goal a season striker when he's having a poor year! We need more goals from midfield too. Ross doesn't score enough to occupy the position behind the striker. If the new playmaker and Mirallas can both chip in with 10+ we should be right up there next year.
