Match Thread Everton v Watford - Preview, Match Report and MotM Poll

[Deulofeumygod]

I still can’t work out what happened in that second half.

Like everyone gave up bar Mina and Gomes and Keane and maybe Rico.

We’re not outplayed, we didn’t show up!

 

[Toffeelover]

Words fail me.

 

[Big Fat Sam]

Going for a draw.

We seem to have real trouble beating awful teams at home this season. It's a real bad sign that we fail to break them down and ultimately don't even end up testing their goalkeepers because we don't have the ability to play any defence-splitting passes, or when we do make such passes, the players aren't on the same wavelength and the ball goes directly out of play or to the keeper.

West Ham (disgraceful defeat), Huddersfield (awful result to draw), Palace (made very, very hard work of it - two late goals to win), Southampton (again coming from behind - need to concede a goal to wake up), Brighton, Fulham (our two straightforward victories), Cardiff (ultimately won but made hard work of it), Newcastle (very poor to not win).

8 games, 17 points from 24. And we haven't even faced a top 10 side yet at home. The points look ok, but look at the opposition and the fact that we just about scraped the points in three of the games.

Failing to beat all of West Ham, Huddersfield and Newcastle at home is just ridiculous. Maybe you can accept one, two if it's the result of a poor refereeing decision, but it's just been that we weren't good enough.

I can even imagine Watford going a goal up and us coming back again with a second half equaliser.

Will be very, very disappointing if we cannot take the points here.

Could smell it a mile off.

 

[Eggs]

....I was impressed with Mina, he’s far more composed than I imagined and looks a leader on the pitch. He was my MoM.

Disappointing performance. So many blamed the Newcastle draw on the introduction of Zouma for Keane, yet we played poorly again last night. For me, Zouma/Mina is our best combination, Newcastle was their first game together and the partnership needs to continue.

Looks like Silva’s Everton will have a similar Boxing Day return to Allardyce’s Everton (27 points), which is an interesting comparison. Encouraging, though, that our new players continue to be generally our best in terms of ability and attitude. A new player or two might give us another spark, i’d like to see Richarlison released to attack from wide left but I appreciate our other striker options look very ordinary at the moment.

 

[Eggsyblueskin]

Outplayed, outfought and outthought.
Very disappointing sequence of games.
It seems for all our apparent progress latterly we resolutely remain a decent mid table club.
We are still a long, long way from where we aspire to be.
Slightly disillusioned at the moment.

 

[KaiserEFC]

I think Watford had the better shape, gameplan and played far more intelligent football than us, I also think they were in our managers head.

When they came out in the second half they’d worked out that to really hurt us all they had to do was frustrate Gomes and Gana and target our weak right side. Silva looked devoid of any type of plan and can count himself very lucky that Digne’s fantastic goal and a poor decision from the officials bailed him out.

 

[Dario Terracotta]

Wasn't at the game,had a hernia operation Saturday,so am moving slower than our midfield currently!!we lacked energy again worryingly,gueye appears to be carrying an injury too,whilst Gomes carries our midfield!!,digne the bright spark,bernard flickered but ultimately frustrated,three at the back Saturday,silvas pre match comments may suggest schneiderlin may come in for gana,the performance will have to be of the level at Chelsea and the derby for us to have any chance of leaving city with any reward at all.

 

[Jimmy Grimble]

Injury to gana. Seamus got hurt early doors and seemed affected thereafter. Walcott on painkillers. Maybe explains a bit of why we were overrun.

 

[Yarrgh]

A bit disappointed to say the least by that.

At least we got the draw. A bad week this week in the new regime, but we fought to get a point which is more than we would have done with Koeman. And we still had an idea which is more than Fat Scam.

I think this is just a blip. Keep on going Marco lad. It'll come good.

Optimism. I still have optimism. Sigh....

 

[Lord Buckethead]

I Digne see that coming.

 

[Eggs]

...be great to score off-side goals and get penalties on a regular basis. Dreadful penalty from Sigurdsson given how well he strikes a ball.

 

[maccavennie]

Wasn't at the game,had a hernia operation Saturday,so am moving slower than our midfield currently!!we lacked energy again worryingly,gueye appears to be carrying an injury too,whilst Gomes carries our midfield!!,digne the bright spark,bernard flickered but ultimately frustrated,three at the back Saturday,silvas pre match comments may suggest schneiderlin may come in for gana,the performance will have to be of the level at Chelsea and the derby for us to have any chance of leaving city with any reward at all.

Hope you are feeling back to 100% Dario fitness levels soon mate

 

[BlueInNZ]

Just finished watching this "live". That was bad. I couldnt bring myself to cheer the equalizer, I didnt tni k we deserved it. Struggled to pick anyone anywhere close to motm. Crap.

 

[Winslow89]

Injury to gana. Seamus got hurt early doors and seemed affected thereafter. Walcott on painkillers. Maybe explains a bit of why we were overrun.

Typical for the time of year I think.

Once we start playing that same starting 11 without having the quality on the bench to rotate for starts, it's difficult.

The absolute gulf in class between Gomes and Davies / the difference between starting Baines and playing Digne / Lookman is dire when he starts and only decent when he's coming off the bench which when you look at games like last night is relatively ineffective.

It's the depth that hurts teams at this time of year and it's why City will dominate for the next X amount of years.

 

[msb]

Poor performance, maybe like they had a hang-over from the RS game, they had too much pre-going out drinks for the Citeh game.

Just a bad evening and I can't help feeling sad that we have thrown away 5 points in the last three matches. Still, much better football than under the previous wazzocks.