First, lets take a look at our points total. This season we only got 36 points from 38 games. This is our lowest number of points in the Premier League era and the lowest points total in the league since 1950/51, the last time we got relegated.
Second, lets take a look at the number of goals scored. This season we scored a mighty 34 goals in 38 games. We were the second lowest goal scorers in the league only ahead of Wolves. Our strikers contributed to just 4 of those goals. 4 out of 34 goals were scored were by strikers - that means that just under 12% of our goals this season were scored by strikers. We also only scored 16 goals at home this season, the lowest in the premier league. There are only 2 games this season where we won a game by more than 1 goal, palace at home and brighton away. That means for 95% of the season, we have had to endure anxiety and press that stupid stopwatch button on our phones praying for the final whistle.
Third, lets take a look at the January transfer window. This season we spent a whopping £0.00 in January. It was a massive risk not buying any players at all given the fact that we all knew DCL had a very poor injury record and Maupay was just having a stinker. Instead, we recalled Ellis Simms from his loan and fed him to the wolves against Liverpool and Man Utd and then when he did do something good i.e. score a crucial goal at stamford bridge to get us a point we just dropped him. Not only did we buy no one, we sold an attacking player called Gordon for over 40 mil and weakened the squad. In comparison our rivals spent alot of money to try and stay up, for example, leeds spent 35.5 mil on Rutter who for some unknown reason just never played, they also bought max wober, brought in weston mckennie on loan and some fella called diogo monteiro who sounds like an extra from ted lasso. Leicester also splashed 15 mil on Soutar, 17 mil on Kristiansen, got Tete on loan and signed some fella called Nathan Opoku. Bournemouth also spent alot of money as did Nottingham Forest and even bottom of the table Southampton spent 22 mil on Sulemana, 18 mil on Onuachu, 6 mil on orsic, 12 mil on alcaraz etc.
Fourth, lets talk about big moments or miracle moments, after dyche came in his very first game we beat the best team in the country at the time, Arsenal, not only did we beat them, we kept a clean sheet against them. You then had the magic moment when coleman scored against leeds and we won, the magic moment when mcneil blasted that first minute goal past a brentford team that had gone 12 games unbeaten at that point and also resulted in our earliest winning goal in our 131 year history, then there was Ellis Simms with the strength of a thousand ox's getting past Koulibaly and slotting it past Kepa to get us a vital point at Stamford Bridge, Micky Keggers 90th minute equaliser at home to spurs when we only had 10 men, the one i will probably never forget which was pickford heroics against leicester to save a pen when we were losing 2-1 and then iwobi scoring a fantastic half volley to get a big point against a fellow relegation struggler, probably the biggest result of the season was winning 5-1 away to Brighton, one of the best teams in the league who probably play the best football second to Man City and had beaten Wolves 6-0 and Man Utd 1-0 just before our visit and showed that they are truly a class side when after losing to us 5-1 they went on to beat Arsenal 3-0 away from home the following week. Not only was that win so crucial, but we had only had 1 away win in the league all season at that point which was away to Southampton and only 3 away wins in 2 seasons. Then you have Yerry Mina's 99th minute equaliser away to Wolves and of course Doucoure's thunderbolt winner past Bournemouth to secure safety. The second half of this season was full of magic moments, key moments, crucial moments, it certainly felt that if we were going to beat Bournemouth today, then it was going to most probably be 1-0 based on how the season has gone.
Fifth, lets talk about Doucoure and Mcneil. Doucoure was a man that was ostracised by Frank Lampard, no one really knows what happened, we heard stories of a punch-up in training or something. He started the first game of the season v Chelsea, then got injured in the next game against Villa and then only made a few sub appearances afterwards until Lampard got sacked. Enter Sean Dyche. In the 15 games that he played under Dyche, he got 5 goals and 2 assists. That's pretty much a goal contribution every other game. If he had not got suspended against Spurs maybe, just maybe we could have avoided a final day relegation drama. Now onto Dwight McNeil, this is his first season at Everton, there were plenty of fans on his back at the start of the season, they said he was not good enough, they said he was too weak, this man is one of the reasons why we have not been relegated. Frank Lampard did not know what to do with him, he played him as an attacking mid, as a striker, as a right winger, a left winger, a full back. Enter Sean Dyche. First game, he gets an assists against Arsenal. He is our highest goal scorer with 7 goals and the only player to reach 10 goal contributions for us this season with 3 assists as well. He scored in both of our only away wins this season, the rocket thunder blaster against Brentford and that performance against Brighton, wow.
Sixth, lets talk about Sean Dyche. We all said that this man deserved a statue if we don't get relegated this season. Well they better start making it. He had no January transfer signings, an injury prone striker, a disjointed side low on confidence and his first task was to play top of the table Arsenal. You have to remember how awful Frank Lampard was as a manager, this was a guy who let Leicester and Southampton beat us at Goodison Park and got battered 7-1 on aggregate by Bournemouth in back to back games. Dyche may not play the prettiest football but what do you expect him to do with no striker, barely a decent full back and an iwobi who cannot cross a ball. I think he's done a fantastic job in getting the players over the line from the position that they were in after lampard left and with no re-inforcements and having to deal with an injury crisis and losing doucoure to suspension. You can question him over team selections at time and his inability to use a sub but when he saw that keane or godrey or holgate were just not good enough he did make changes in the following match and in the end he got it right brining Mina back into the team, dropping Maupay and dropping other poor performers like Godfrey.
Seventh, lets talk about the board and headlock gate. In the past there have been many vocal supporters who did not like Kenwright and the board but this is the first time I have really seen a massive amount of support against the board and also against the owner Moshiri. After headlock gate, it just got even worse. For Dyche and his players to have to deal with that going on in the background amidst a relegation battle could not have been easy. I can only hope in the next couple of weeks we will hear more about this supposed investment from MSP and that there will be some changes made at board level which will see Kenwright leave amongst others. In an ideal world, Moshiri will sell the club as well but that does not seem likely anymore.
I have probably missed out on a few things but I also want to give honourable mentions to our shirt sponsor Stake, i despise gambling sponsors, we must do better and I am glad the government is making changes so that there will no longer be anymore gambling sponsors. Ruben Vinagre who made 2 sub appearances this season, what happened there and why wasn't his loan terminated? Winning only 1 cup game this season away to Fleetwood (barely) and winning the Sydney Super Cup on pens (more trophies than Liverpool this season).
All in all, this was a disastrous season, whilst Wimbledon of 1994 and Coventry of 1998 was emotionally a rollercoaster of a day, over the course of a full season, they were certainly not as bad and morbid as this season. In 93/94 we actually got off to a very bright start that year with comfortable wins against southampton and sheffield united, we even beat our rivals Liverpool 2-0 and beat Swindon 6-2 and Chelsea 4-2. In 97/98 we again had some good results beating barnsley 4-2, our rivals liverpool again 2-0, back to back 3-1 wins against Palace and Chelsea and comfortable beat Leeds 2-0. Last season was bad and we will always have that magic night at goodison park where we came back from 2-0 down at half time to beat palace 3-2 but looking back, that result didn't mean we survived relegation. Even if we had lost that game, we would have stayed up by 1 point because burnley failed to beat newcastle at home, but i am of course glad we did win that game because I don't think i could have coped with a last day decider away to arsenal in any event.
All in all, for me, this is our worst ever season since at least 50/51 and our biggest escape of all time. There needs to be huge changes made in the summer at board level and also player wise. There are far too many charlatans in this squad, they show up for 1-2 big games and go missing for the other 36.
NSNO
Up the Toffees
We did it! (just about). Time to relax and enjoy the summer.
