Underwhelming Everton players that you loved #2: Denis Stracqualursi

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Summerskin

Player Valuation: £35m
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KILL IT WITH FIRE!!

Now this guy will go down in Everton folklore, one of the darkest periods in our modern history will in retrospect have some element of warmth to it when you're still sitting in The Spellow chatting on about Everton in 2078 when we've moved to Liscart to avoid administration.

Retrospect is a funny thing but at the time it was horrible, awful performances against QPR & Blackburn were compounded by the sale of Yakubu, Beckford and Mikel Arteta.

It was a pretty grim day, I was working in my job with Sefton Council at the time F5ing the sh*t out of the Guardians deadline day blog, then the f*cking Kopite next door comes in and breaks that Beckford and Yakubu had gone; now Yakubu I would of happily seen the back of years ago but Beckford was something else, 10 goals in his first season after jumping up 2 divisions is a great return, especially when considering that AJ & Beattie basically achieved the same thing for a combined 15 million royal foils.

My girlfriend at the time had the unfortunate proposition of spending the night at mine, one eye on her magnificent breasts and one eye transfixed on that horrible moving beacon at the bottom of the Sky Sports News bar, and then it happened.

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I knew the gig, man.

I knew times were tough, I even knew that Mikky had been playing like horsesh*t for the best part of a year, but really? There was that half chance in our collective minds that he'd suddenly turn into the 2007 Arteta we all knew and loved and start bumming teams everywhere, coinciding with our glide up the table.

It never came, and we got two loan signings in at the last minute...Demolition Man and Carlos Tevez' ugly cousin.

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After a decent enough draw with Villa, a good 3 points against Wigan and a Phil Neville thunderbolt against West Brom things actually looked decent, like little ol' plucky Everton would fight their way out of trouble...then Moyes gave us that "knife to a gun fight" bollocks and the next 2-3 months I had the mispleasure of watching Everton play, it was some of the worst football i've ever seen in my lifetime, truly; the mauling at Chelsea were Cahill was brought off for Phil Neville really hurt whilst the performances against the likes of Stoke and Norwich at home meant I spent most of my weekends at the time sitting alone in my dark room hugging my knees.

Straq got the odd look in and was incredibly off the pace for his first few games despite getting a cute flick on assist for Rappin' Roy in his first appearance, he'd do the rudimentary things like holding a ball up well before bizarrely thinking Leighton Baines was the Toffee Lady and pinging one into the Paddock or something, it wasn't great.

I think it was the Norwich game where things started to slowly turn for Denis, 20 minutes to go he was brought on to partner Louis Saha up front and he did well, he laid on this beautiful flicked header into Saha's path which brought a great save out of Ruddy but the game ended 1-1 and we all went home wondering where the [Poor language removed] our goals were going to come from still.

It was at his next home game against David Brent's Swansea where the first bit of Straq-magic was seen, again brought on as a sub he latched onto a through ball before Tim Cahill'ing two centre halves and drawing a foul against the Swans, and yet whilst the ball was still on the floor in front of him he did this kind of half Salmon/John Terry flap at it with his head thinking play was still on, of course it wasn't and he looked like a tit, but I sat there in the Main Stand (sigh) acknowledging that the lad at least had a bit of heart, the polar opposite to Louis Saha who was painful to watch at the time.

Everton staggered through the Christmas period like your nan on Boxing Day after a few too many Snowballs and suddenly the New Year was upon us, Howard fluked a goal in one of the worst performances i've ever seen from Everton before our resident tonking at White Hart Lane and another bore-draw with Villa left us with more food for thought about our attacking play, but it was one night in late January when Straq actually bagged his first ever goal for Everton! Against Fulham in the F.A Cup...

...and I was in the f*cking Lower Gladdy bogs having a piss, wasn't I?

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It transpired after the game that he broke into tears upon scoring his first goal for the club and whether it was a good bit of PR or genuine heartfelt words, it got the majority of Evertonians back on his side and things were to take an even better turn only 4 days later, another night under the floodlights at Goodison.

His individual performance against Man City turned out to be the most unintentionally hilarious thing I have ever witnessed, it was nothing short of incredible; I'm sure he took a few bullets of whatever Royston had before he took to the pitch because his work rate was astounding, from the first whistle he took it upon himself to bum Lescott and Kompany into submission time after time, any hopeless-lost-cause-hoof from the back turned into an attack because of his willingness to run for the ball.

After a very early chance where one of his headers was hooked off the line he was again chasing another lost cause, as the ball was rolling out towards the corner flag between the Park End and the Main Stand it seemed like Lescott was going to easily see it out for a throw, enter Straq.

He chases the ball down, slides Lescott into the crowd with hawkeye accuracy and wins Everton a throw-in, there ain't much better than seeing a gobsh*te ex-blue have his arse handed to him by some player most people haven't even heard of, it nearly rivalled Fellaini's pirouette on Bellamy in terms of crowd reaction.

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We won 1-0 and Denis nearly had to be carried off after such a Herculian performance, the crowd responded to his late substitution by giving the lad a standing ovation.

We basically bought two more boss players on deadline day and haven't looked back, Straq got the odd look in and bagged himself another two goals against a woeful Chelsea and Blackpool in an entertaining F.A Cup game but really it was that performance against City that took him to our hearts, despite his limited ability as a centre forward.

He was a total throwback to a bygone era, a tall, commanding in the air sh*thouse centre forward that loved to torment defenders...just like that bully in school who only picks on smart kids 'cause he secretly couldn't put 2 and 2 together, Denis made up for his lack of footballing skill by wearing his heart on his sleeve and seizing an opportunity that 99% of the population will never even get close to.

We decided not to make an offer for Denis permanently and judging by our current play/squad it was a smart move, Denis moved back to his homeland and joined San Lorenzo where he's apparently doing quite well.

He left us a personal letter where he stated that playing at Goodison was "a beautiful dream" and adding that his time with us was the best year of his career, something which he won't forget.

Denis for that very brief period was a little beacon of light in a very dark time for Everton Football Club, not too dissimilar to how we all felt about Big Dunc in the mid 90s.

They say effort goes a long way in football, and we still haven't seen anyone put in a shift like this lad did that one night against City; for all his limitations, you can bet i'll be telling my kids and grandkids about this guy when i'm walking up County Rd in the not too distant future.

Gracias, Denis!

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Brilliant Summersk!n.

I dont think anyone appreciates full on determination and effort as much as Evertonians.

I remember watching the City match and I was literally off my seat shouting at the TV in sheer delight at his performance, something which I cant say I've ever done when based on an individual performance.

Hope some day he'll be back!
 

Brilliant Summersk!n.

I dont think anyone appreciates full on determination and effort as much as Evertonians.

I remember watching the City match and I was literally off my seat shouting at the TV in sheer delight at his performance, something which I cant say I've ever done when based on an individual performance.

Hope some day he'll be back!

Exactly the same

I remember laughing to myself at what I was watching. Weird. It was just incredible
 
Such a big grin on my face reading that. God bless Denis.

That performance against Citeh...

/shakes head and laughs to myself.
 

Great write up (as was the Bily one)

I think Denis gets unfair stick really. He wasnt a bad player at all just not very flashy. His passing and holding up of the ball was actually pretty good and when he got his head on things he actually did something with it as opposed to just winning random headers.

He probably wasnt quite good enough but he certainly wasnt the worst player I have ever seen.
 
That attempted header while on the floor summed him up. Although not the greatest, loved the passion the lad had, like one of us blues jumped out of the stand and had 90mins, that was Straq every time he got on the pitch.

Great write up summerskin, enjoying these mate.
 
BTW tears at this:

His individual performance against Man City turned out to be the most unintentionally hilarious thing I have ever witnessed, it was nothing short of incredible; I'm sure he took a few bullets of whatever Royston had before he took to the pitch because his work rate was astounding, from the first whistle he took it upon himself to bum Lescott and Kompany into submission time after time, any hopeless-lost-cause-hoof from the back turned into an attack because of his willingness to run for the ball.

lol
 

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