There’ll be some in game factors the manager can control yes but more than likely we’ll end up in a very similar position between 11th-7th as we have been under recent managers because the fundamentals are not changing from season to season.
We are simply unable to back any manager with a decent squad of 22 players. Every season since I remember watching us there’s always a position in the team that we have only one suitable option for, or sometimes not even one. Why can other premier league teams some who have only just been recently promoted have strength in depth across most positions and we fail season after season at this.
We are also unable to ever keep our best players available for any manager. The last time this happened was Martinez’s first season when we went relatively injury free but every season since has been utterly blighted by injury after injury to key players that take ages to recover and even then aren’t fully right when they return. How come every other premier league team at the moment can select from pretty much full squads and once again we are down to the bare bones of kids and goalkeepers being sat on the bench.
Obviously issue 2 just exacerbates the failings of issue 1. God forbid Allan or Docuoure goes down this season because we really would struggle to win much at all.
Once someone at Everton gets to grip with these problems then we can maybe start laying the blame for our problems with the manager but at the moment it’s a bit like blaming a ships captain for not being a good sailor when he’s trying to navigate a dingy through a tsunami.
Im sick of seeing it though, it’s every season, no doubt the usual people will be out with the ‘injuries happen to everyone’ line but there’s a consistent pattern to ours.
At ‘best’ we manage to keep an on 11 on the pitch until about the first international break at which point there’s normally a strain of some sort that should keep them out for a game or two but actually keeps them out for a few months. We then get to around November going into Christmas where just as we are expecting a few players back we then lose others in key positions until eventually we’re down to absolute rag tag line ups over Christmas. We then patch the team up a bit during the new year as players return (but not for any key games) and then just as look like we might make something at the end of the season a key player will go down to just ensure we don’t.
At worst we get a raft of circulate injuries/broken bones/ quadricep tears through the key players of the team so that we’re completely screwed and when they come back they’re half the player they were.
It plagued Moyes continuously, Martinez was a bit more fortunate but even then the Kone Traore McCarthy Oviedo injuries cost him hugely in key moments. Koeman lost his main attacking signing in Bolasie, Allardyce was absolutely butchered by injuries, Silva lost his job because of the crippling injuries, and it cost Ancelotti Europe.
We simply cannot carry on running a football operation that can’t give their manager a suitable squad of players and can’t even keep the players we do have fit in any single premier league season.
I don't disagree with any of that
But I can still blame the manager when things like a style of play (which is crap/one-dimensional) and set-pieces are crap.
Like I can say he's done a fair few good things too.
The issue is, and I'm sick of fans buying into it en mass like we always do, is that we once again look like we only have one way of playing. Any time we've been required to step out of that, we can't do it.
I know we need better players but I just don't get this collective amnesia Everton fans manage to have just cause we got to celebrate a friggin draw at Old Trafford.
We can't control games at all, in any sense. Our entire strategy is to go direct, which is fine when it works but there's going to be a lot of incidents when it doesn't work and that's why we need more than one way of playing. It's why I keep saying that, IMO, the level of performances have been pretty consistent in our home games this season. Bang average, 6/10 displays but we've fortunately played teams where we've had that bit more quality to go and get the game won in 5/10-min spells. Today we didn't have that and West Ham are far more balanced than us and it shows.
Yes, injuries haven't helped, but we're Everton, we always have injuries. That's on the club to sort out like you say but they've shown no signs of doing it. The control seems to be with Benitez now so if it's not good enough then he needs to sort it doesn't he - i.e. demand we get new people in.
