http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football...erto-martinez-becomes---the-butt-of-the-joke/
Everton manager Roberto Martinez becomes the butt of the joke as Liverpool thrash neighbours
21 April 2016 • 6:57am
It was a chastening evening for Roberto Martinez Credit: ACTION IMAGES
After a game in which his team
demonstrated all the resolve and battling spirit of a damp paper bag, Roberto Martínez faced up to his media responsibilities with his customary dignity. If only his team had shown the same character out
on the Anfield pitch. If only his tactics and preparations were as admirable as his public persona.
“A horrible, horrible experience for everyone connected to the football club,” was his assessment of what must be
the most humiliating derby defeat in Everton’s recent history. “Everything that could have gone wrong, went wrong. Nobody deserves to be in that chain of events.” You can only feel for the Everton manager.
Liverpool celebrated what Martínez later described as a 'horrible experience' for Evertonians
Needing to demonstrate effectively to his club’s followers this week that he is the man to take his club on, that he has a plan, that he is in charge, by the end of this match he was standing alone in his technical area, arms folded, silent, woebegone, staring down the barrel of his own demise. Here’s how bad it was: as the opposition supporters mockingly chanted his name, around Anfield he had become a joke figure.
But then he cannot have been surprised. He has been heading in this direction for some time. Rarely in the history of this derby have the two teams approached the encounter in such contrasting mood. This may have been the battle of the semi-finalists, two clubs with half a mind on impending last-four encounters, but there was just one problem for those of a blue persuasion: all the excitement, passion and zest here was generated by their opponents.
Martínez heads toward the tunnel following his side's humiliation Credit: rex features
After the breathless drama of victory over Dortmund last week, a result achieved in the proper Liverpool way, around Anfield there is a bounce in the collective step. In the shadow of the giant stand nearing completion, those on the red side are convinced by their manager. Behind
Jürgen Klopp’s expansive grin they only see progress, advancement, good things. The Europa League semi against Villarreal next Thursday is but a staging post in the upward march.
For the blue side, things are altogether darker. Optimism is no longer currency around Goodison. Amongst Evertonians, Saturday’s FA Cup semi-final is a tipping point, now the last chance for their manager to deliver with a team that has been woefully under-achieving under his control. The blue side have lost patience with the growing gap between talk and delivery. Klopp is reckoned the real thing by his following; Martínez regarded as a vessel rapidly emptying.
And the pattern of the game followed the trajectory of the respective managers. In a five-minute burst at the end of the first half, Klopp’s Liverpool tore a further hole in Martínez’s bluster. Their gander up, they overwhelmed an unhappy, demotivated Everton.
Martínez could have no excuse in his line-up. Like Klopp, he had picked his strongest available side. And here they were being systematically dismantled. The extent of their haplessness was demonstrated when Ramiro Funes Mori, who had looked an accident waiting to happen throughout the first half, was dispatched from the pitch for a wretchedly ill-timed assault on Divock Origi with forty minutes still remaining. An assault he compounded by beating his chest to the Everton fans as he left the pitch, as if he had done something around which they should rally.
Ramiro Funes Mori was handed a straight red card for his challenge on Divock Origi Credit: action images
And how the Liverpool followers enjoyed their neighbours’ gathering dismay.
“You haven’t won a trophy since 1995,” chorused the Kop, delighting in the rapidly diminishing standing of their rivals.
This is what hurts Evertonians, that a season which promised so much is slipping away like candyfloss in a shower. How, they wonder, can a team featuring such talents as John Stones, Ross Barkley and Romelu Lukaku under-perform on such a regular basis? And here they were demonstrating the issues.
There was Stones, a defender Chelsea were prepared to break the bank to acquire last summer, leaden-footed as he was easily out-jumped for the first goal. There was Lukaku shown up by his compatriot Origi’s hunger and initiative. And there was Barkley suffering the final indignity of being substituted for Tom Cleverley. No wonder he looked fed up as he made his way to the bench.
Everton supporters started toe evening off in good spirits Credit: AP
The Evertonians in the Anfield Road end had begun with a show of loyalty, insisting they were on the march with Bobby’s army. But their presence became ever less evident as Liverpool grew in ascendancy. When the substitute Daniel Sturridge supplied a sublime finish to score the third goal with half an hour remaining, they were pouring for the exits, waved on their way by jubilant crowing from the other end of the stadium. By the time the fourth rattled the netting, there were few remaining to face the scorn. Even their directors had left the posh seats.
But those who stayed on knew who to blame. At the final whistle, the last few standing bellowed their invective in the direction of the technical area. Martínez, though, appeared unmoved, alone with his thoughts. “It is not about my job,” he suggested afterwards. Another showing like this on Saturday and it almost certainly will be.
