AdamTheGreatOneB
Player Valuation: £15m
I woke up this morning feeling a little bit down. I’m usually optimistic when it comes to Everton. Well I have been for the majority of the Moyes era anyway. The thing is I’m really struggling to see where we go from here.
After steadying the ship on his arrival and a few yoyo seasons Moyes gradually steered Everton to become an established top six club in England. Obviously we had that amazing season where we finished fourth in 04/05, followed by an underwhelming 05/06, but by the end of 06/07 we had found our way back to sixth place. The next season we managed to improve on that with a fifth placed and I remember thinking at that time, can we do this again? At that time we were neck and neck with Aston Villa, Spurs were poised and ready to challenge again and Man City had just become rich (and were soon to become obscenely rich). However we held them all off and finished fifth again and almost added the FA Cup to our cabinet which was another great achievement in my eyes considering our lack of finances compared to our competitors. After that FA Cup final in 2009 though I struggled to see how we could progress any further. Surely Man City would overtake us now they had become billionaires, Spurs were still splashing the cash and actually stabilising now, and Aston Villa and even Sunderland were tipped to push us aside due to their superior finances. As we know we were pushed down to 8th place last season and this year it could be worse.
The way it stands right now we are obviously a million miles away from competing with Man Utd, Chelsea, Arsenal and now Man City and Spurs financially. Liverpool for all their problems will no doubt have money pumped into them from somewhere for them to step above us again in the near future. Aston Villa have suddenly found £18 million to throw at Darren Bent, again sums of money we can’t possibly compete with. Even Sunderland, Stoke, Newcastle, Birmingham and Blackburn can or will soon enough be able to outspend us. Not only that our team that probably peaked in 2009 is starting to break up with no sign of anyone coming in as replacements. David Moyes thinks, and probably rightfully so because of finances that a top half finish is the best we can hope for these days. So surely it won’t be long before a lot more of our players follow Pienaar out of the door because either they want to try and find success somewhere else because it’s not going to be possible at Everton or because the club needs to sell them to raise funds.
Even more worrying for me is how long will Moyes continue to stay with us knowing that he may have taken us as far as he possibly can under the circumstances? And if he does leave, what other decent manager would want to work here under such strict financial restraints and expect to get success? How much longer can we be expected to defy the odds and compete with much richer teams around us? I really am worried that this could be the start of a downward spiral back down table.
After steadying the ship on his arrival and a few yoyo seasons Moyes gradually steered Everton to become an established top six club in England. Obviously we had that amazing season where we finished fourth in 04/05, followed by an underwhelming 05/06, but by the end of 06/07 we had found our way back to sixth place. The next season we managed to improve on that with a fifth placed and I remember thinking at that time, can we do this again? At that time we were neck and neck with Aston Villa, Spurs were poised and ready to challenge again and Man City had just become rich (and were soon to become obscenely rich). However we held them all off and finished fifth again and almost added the FA Cup to our cabinet which was another great achievement in my eyes considering our lack of finances compared to our competitors. After that FA Cup final in 2009 though I struggled to see how we could progress any further. Surely Man City would overtake us now they had become billionaires, Spurs were still splashing the cash and actually stabilising now, and Aston Villa and even Sunderland were tipped to push us aside due to their superior finances. As we know we were pushed down to 8th place last season and this year it could be worse.
The way it stands right now we are obviously a million miles away from competing with Man Utd, Chelsea, Arsenal and now Man City and Spurs financially. Liverpool for all their problems will no doubt have money pumped into them from somewhere for them to step above us again in the near future. Aston Villa have suddenly found £18 million to throw at Darren Bent, again sums of money we can’t possibly compete with. Even Sunderland, Stoke, Newcastle, Birmingham and Blackburn can or will soon enough be able to outspend us. Not only that our team that probably peaked in 2009 is starting to break up with no sign of anyone coming in as replacements. David Moyes thinks, and probably rightfully so because of finances that a top half finish is the best we can hope for these days. So surely it won’t be long before a lot more of our players follow Pienaar out of the door because either they want to try and find success somewhere else because it’s not going to be possible at Everton or because the club needs to sell them to raise funds.
Even more worrying for me is how long will Moyes continue to stay with us knowing that he may have taken us as far as he possibly can under the circumstances? And if he does leave, what other decent manager would want to work here under such strict financial restraints and expect to get success? How much longer can we be expected to defy the odds and compete with much richer teams around us? I really am worried that this could be the start of a downward spiral back down table.
