Blog Archives
Nicky Maynard for Everton?
Again, this is just me doing some late night thinking…
So, Everton have sold Diniyar Bilyaletdinov for £5m. Fine, he never really settled in England and the club have done the right thing in cutting their losses. £5m of losses for those counting.
Anyway, depending on how much of that £5m is going to be made available for reinvestment, David Moyes could do a lot worse than look at Bristol City’s contract rebel Nicky Maynard. Everton need goals, vibrancy, and energy – and his contract status will make him available for around £2.5m.
Yes, he’s unproven in the Premier League, but he would bring some much needed hunger to that forward line. Maynard needs a stage to prove himself on, Moyes can provide it. Championship player or not, Maynard can flat-out finish.
Goals, pace, hunger, and £2.5m. It’s not a bad combination is it? I think this boy would be a huge hit at this level, and whoever is brave enough to gamble on him will be rewarded.
David Moyes is restricting Everton – just as much as the lack of cash
I read an article somewhere this morning – ok, it was in the Mirror – that pointed to the lack of Match Of The Day coverage as a symptom of Everton’s decline into viewer apathy.
Apparently, Saturday’s game was billed as the latest chapter of Blackburn’s bid to survive – within which Everton just happened to be playing a supporting role in. In truth, the article was a bit pedantic, but you can’t fail to recognise the greater point to it. Everton aren’t really relevant anymore.
Obviously context is needed, because all that distinguishes Everton from the other 5-10 also-rans in the league is their past. But it’s that past that makes the present so jarring.
It’s not even really that the club has fallen so far, it’s that all the clubs that were traditionally their rivals have passed them by. The Premier League is no longer a level playing field, or at least the separation is even more exaggerated than it ever has been, and Everton of course have their ankles tied together by financial red tape.
That’s the first problem; money and the myriad issues with the ownership. But secondly, the club is now stalling because of David Moyes. Of all the managers in the Premier League, Moyes probably has the easiest ride – he’s protected by the mitigating circumstances of financial doom.
Bad result? We’ve got no money. Good result? Miracle worker. A proper, old-fashioned no-lose situation.
Bill Kenwright is too afraid of what might happen to his club if Moyes ever left Goodison Park, and I can’t understand that. But at some point, there has to be an appreciation for his manager’s failings.
Why does the club always start badly?
Why does the team consistently drop points at home to inferior teams?
There’s a lot of rhetoric about Moyes in the press, and his water-into-wine capabilities – but truthfully, the only thing he’s actually a master of is managing expectation. Watch an interview with him the next time Everton get beaten or drop points, the shoulder-shrugging abdication of responsibility isn’t good enough for a club this size.
There’s talent at Everton too; Cahill, Fellaini, Saha, Rodwell, Baines – why are these players not playing at their best? Because of the manager. There’s no financial reason for players under-performing. The myth around Moyes is that he makes the most of what he has. Really? Should a team containing those types of players be languishing in 14th?
Money this, money that – sure, but he’s gone stale, and he’s taken the club as far as he can with his set of abilities.
Man City to beat Liverpool on Wednesday night – 2.60 with Paddy Power. Sign-up for your £20 welcome bonus.
Four Things We’ve Learned – Tottenham, Blackburn, Everton, Michael Oliver
Tottenham look realistic challengers for Champions League qualification
As the weeks pass, it’s becoming obvious that being humbled by the Manchester clubs is not necessarily a true indicator of where a team is – it’s going to happen to a lot of teams this year.
Luka Modric looks happy, Ledley King is playing, Gareth Bale looks to be regaining his form, and Emmanuel Adebayor is scoring goals. As long as all four of those remain constant, then Spurs are the fourth best side in the country.
As is the club’s habit, they made winning at Wigan far harder than it needed to be, but it’s a sign of progression from last year that they headed back down the M1 with three points rather than one. What marked the successful 2009/2010 season out, was Harry Redknapp’s ability to take points from lesser teams on the road – Wigan, Stoke, West Ham – and that seems to be a habit that’s been rediscovered.
Now the tricky start has been navigated, the fixture list is extremely kind to Tottenham between now and Christmas – Redknapp will consider every game until Chelsea visit the Lane on the 20th December as ‘extremely winnable’. If Liverpool continue to stutter, and Arsenal don’t snap out of whatever is afflicting them, then Spurs could have a very healthy advantage by the time 2012 comes.
Blackburn need to change their manager…now.
Steve Kean has Laurent Koscielny and Per Mertesacker to thank for keeping him in employment, because without Blackburn’s anomalous result against Arsenal nobody would have any doubt that he’s not capable of taking them anywhere but the Championship. In retrospect, that win might do the club more harm than good, because it incorrectly suggested that a corner had been turned. One week later, and one insipid performance against Newcastle later, and the reality looks a little more stark.
Look around the sides that will be fighting to stay out of the relegation places, and look at their managers. QPR, Swansea, Wigan, Norwich, maybe West Brom – would you take Steve Kean over any of those managers? Not based on anything we’ve seen from Kean so far.
The owners need to forget about the circumstances by which they appointed Kean, because fans will forgive boardroom mistakes – what they won’t forget is the failure to correct them.
Complaints about Everton’s negativity at Manchester City are absurd.
This is part of a general point, and a bit of a personal grievance against something that’s been around for a while now. Arsene Wenger used to make the same complaint when visiting teams set-up defensively at the Emirates Stadium and likewise Jose Mourinho whenever his team dropped any points – moaning about a team being negative.
It’s not a footballing crime to settle for a point when away from home against a more illustrious and better-resourced opponent. That it’s contrary to the instant gratification, entertainment culture of English football is completely irrelevant.
Given what Manchester City have already done to Bolton, Swansea, and Tottenham, is it not reasonable for teams facing them to adopt a guarded approach? Outside of Manchester United and Chelsea, any team that wants to trade blows with City will get an absolute hammering.
If you’re David Moyes, and you face the kind of players that Roberto Mancini has at his disposal, then you’re fully-entitled to employ whichever tactics you feel give you the best chance of a positive result.
The people that complain about this are the same set of dullards who bemoan Stoke’s style of football – it’s a complaint without any basis, and I’m yet to hear a convincing argument against ‘parking the bus’.
Michael Oliver enjoys making ‘big decisions’
What’s the quality we crave in refereeing more than any other? Consistency. We want an equal application of the rules at all grounds by all officials.
Michael Oliver was praised for his zero-tolerance of shirt pulling in his decision to give a penalty against Armand Traore, but isn’t that contrary to the consistency that we’re asking for?
That kind of offence takes place in every game, every week and is almost never punished – so either contact with the shirt is always a free-kick or penalty, or it never is.
Oliver has a history of giving what look like incredibly soft penalties for shirt-pulling, there was one at West Brom two years ago which was mystifying. Now, that may be a literal and correct interpretation of the rule, but then all the referees have to act in the same way. You can’t have one rogue official with a personal agenda against a particular nuance of the game, it doesn’t work.
Behind this, you also suspect that Oliver quite enjoys the attention that such decisions award him with – there’s a bit of the ‘Uriah Rennie’ about him. The game should be about the players, not the officials.
No more of this please.
The Mail joins the silliness over Everton’s Ross Barkley
Sorry about this, but for the third Sunday in a row we’re going to have deal with another epically untrue Ross Barkley rumour.
Two weeks ago it was The People linking him to Manchester United, last week it was The Mirror claiming he was off to Chelsea, and this week The Mail have just joined those stories together – added in Manchester City and an extra £10m – and reprinted it.
What do all of those articles have in common? None of them contain any quotations, or any credible theory other than ‘he’s really a bit good, so City, United and Chelsea would probably want him’.
The Mail’s effort is just as bad as everything that has come before, the article riddled with rhetoric about bids being ‘prepared’, Barkley having ‘more potential than Wayne Rooney’, and the obvious 1+1 that supports all of this – Everton’s financial situation.
Truthfully, there will probably be a day when Barkley does leave Everton – and it may well be for one of the bigger clubs. But at the moment, there’s absolutely nothing to support that happening. This kind of reporting is infuriating, because it’s circumstantial guessing – it belongs on gossip websites, not in national newspapers.
Come on, write some more toss about Fabio Capello and his plot to destroy English football – we all know that’s what you really want to be doing.
Early Morning Notes: Aston Villa & David Moyes, Tottenham & Berbatov, and Bin Hammam
As most will now by now Mohamed Bin Hammam has pulled out of the race to become the next FIFA President, hours before he’s due to stand before the Ethics Committee – 12pm GMT by the way. Bin Hammam has said that his withdrawal would prevent FIFA’s name being ‘dragged more in the mud’ – but in reality this is probably nonsense, the Qatari clearly feels that removing himself from the ballot will lead to a less intense investigation into his actions. Surely if you’re completely innocent of all allegation then there would be no need to withdraw from the Presidential race? We don’t buy any of this, Blatter and Bin Hammam are as bent as each other – unfortunately for both of them, they’re dominos stacked next to each other.
Bin Hammam went on to say that he ‘remains committed to change within FIFA’ in the interests of ‘furthering the cause of democracy within it’. If by ‘change’ he means ‘making sure everything stays the same’ and by ‘democracy’ he means ‘autocracy run by cash flow’ then yes, he’s telling the truth.
So we’ll be investigating how Qatar ended up with the World Cup now will we?
Rumours are gathering pace that Dimitar Berbatov may be set to return to Tottenham in the very near future. After being left out of United’s squad last night, this may very well be a case of the papers adding the Bulgarian’s disaffection to Spurs’ need for a forward and coming up with the most obvious solution. It still seems fairly unlikely, and we’re not totally convinced that he’ll be welcomed back to North London with open arms.
DJ Campbell is apparently wanted in the North East by Sunderland. Depending on his price tag this would probably make sense, Asamoah Gyan looked very isolated before he got injured – and Campbell’s coming back to the Premier League one way or another.
The Metro is running a story about Aston Villa‘s interest in appointing David Moyes as manager. Doubts remain over Gerard Houllier’s health, and the logic here is that Moyes is so irritated by another Summer with scant finances at Everton that he’ll consider jumping ship. Probably not, Moyes is destined for higher places than VIlla Park.
Nigel Reo-Coker is on the verge of joining Olympiakos. Like so many before him, he’ll return in six months time blaming his ‘inability to settle abroad’ – which translates to being unable to learn the language.
Owl Moaning – Premier League Weekend
In a quest to find an easy way to fill the spot previously occupied on this site by ’5 things that we’ve learnt’, we come up with this – lots of small points from the weekend that take far less time to write out.
Frankly it’s easier and requires far less time…
* Zat Knight not being dismissed for his clear professional foul on Jason Roberts. The only explanation for which is presumably the assumption that despite being through on goal, Roberts would obviously have missed.
* Does John Terry continually have to give his input into the referee’s decision process. It would be nice if a decision could go against Chelsea without Terry and friends feeling the need to surround the referee and/or pick up the ball and walk away with it.
* At what point does David Moyes stop being a manager that ‘has done a great job with limited resources’ and start being under pressure? With the team assembled at Goodison Park, it’s not unfair to say that Everton have been under-performing for the last three years. Every season seems to pre-fixed with an awful start, and given that the table doesn’t lie – why is Moyes immune from the pressures that afflict his managerial peer group? Injuries are sadly part of the game, they do not provide you with asterisk at the end of the season.
* Slightly against the grain, but we actually support Carlos Tevez in the media’s current reason d’etre. Jealousy it may be, but that City have now discovered a problem that can’t be solved by simply throwing cash at it is actually quite refreshing. Clearly Tevez has harboured an ambition to leave the club for quite a while now – he’s actually quoted as wanting out over the summer – so that he possesses the scoring record that he does is a credit to him, as much as his undeniable effort level is.
* More worrying for City, is that after Tevez’s comments, Adebayor’s obvious desire to move on, and Mario Balotelli’s generally sulky demeanour, the club currently have one forward who actually wants to stay at the club.
* If Blackpool win their game in hand on the rest of the table, they will go seventh. They’re a credit to the league.
* Heurelho Gomes’ mistake yesterday is sadly the difference between teams that challenge for titles and teams that don’t. Gomes has a lot of qualities – being probably the best shot-stopper in the league is one of them – but don’t be surprised if Harry Redknapp starts shopping about for a replacement in the summer.
5 things we’ve learned…
Arsenal have finally got a backbone….
It’s not unfair to argue that the trip to Blackburn presented more potential problems to Arsene Wenger than the opening day journey to Anfield. Because of the particular threat posed by Sam Allardyce’s team, and the frailties associated with Arsenal, many could be forgiven for predicating a home win. What followed was fairly predictable, two well-worked away goals, and an abundance of aggression, persistence and direct football from the home team. Only Arsenal didn’t buckle.
One of the major criticisms of this youthful team has been their inability to close out victories – think Wigan away last season and Tottenham at home the year before. But on Saturday lunchtime, once Andrey Arshavin had given them the lead they never really looked like surrendering it. Even with the vast Christopher Samba deployed as a utility forward for the last twenty minutes, Blackburn’s aerial onslaught never really looked threatening – the much-derided Manuel Almunia coping admirably under the high ball.
A turning point? Maybe. Still, the ease with which El-Hadji Diouf rounded Laurent Koscielny for Blackburn’s solitary goal should be cause for concern.
Being called up the England squad is no longer an achievement…
Matthew Upson, Michael Carrick, and Scott Carson have done nothing between them to be included for next week’s Euro qualifiers. What now looks to be the case, is that the refreshingly experimental squad that Fabio Capello picked for the Hungary friendly was selected with the objective of satisfying the press. Given that neither of the three mentioned will ever be good enough for International football, there’s no justifiable reason for inclusion. Capello can’t even claim that they’re there to provide back-up through their experience – Upson is a huge liability at club level alone, Carrick is one of the biggest myths in English football, and Scott Carson has one disaster-ridden cap to his name. If events don’t go as planned against Hungary, do any of those three offer a credible alternative option? The selection of Jermain Defoe should also be met with groans, for as good a player as he is, he’s been woefully short of form for the last 6 months and apparently requires an operation. Last week we said that Andy Carroll had an England future, and while we don’t agree that a Premier League hat-trick should – as some seem to think – mean that a player should automatically start for England, what would be the harm in him being exposed to an International environment.
Everton’s troubles are of their own making…
Why is David Moyes so baffled by his side’s inability to convert their chances? If the only recognised forward you have on the pitch is a player that has come from League 2 and his name barely gets mentioned in commentary, surely that’s where the mystery dies. It’s almost as if Moyes is leaving Jermaine Beckford in the side to try and validate whatever impulse he had in signing him – especially when Louis Saha is left on the bench. You’re cutting off your nose to spite your face David.
Harry Redknapp’s job is not as secure as he believes it to be…
‘It was just one of those days’.
Hmmm… your side seems to have more of those than most though, don’t they Harry. Anybody reading the Owl back in the dark days will remember a statistic we pulled up about Tottenham’s failure to overcome poor teams at home. If Spurs had overcome Stoke, Wolves, and Hull at home, whilst also not throwing away points at Everton, Molineux, and the Stadium of Light – that fourth-placed finish would have been a title-challenge.
We remember a conversation with a Spurs fan at the time of Redknapp’s appointment, where it was believed that ‘triffic’ was the right man to stabilise the club and take them to a certain level – premature as it is to say it, that level seems to be where the club is now.
Refereeing inconsistency is worse than we thought…
Ok, so not something that we’ve learned, more a theory we’ve developed. Fouls on certain players are officiated with varying degrees of severity. Go in late but without malice on Fernando Torres, and you’ll receive a red card. However, kick Joey Barton around the pitch for an hour and half in a premeditated attempt to ‘wind him up’, and you’ll be unlucky to see yellow. Karl Henry could very well have seen red for more than one of his challenges on the Newcastle captain, but didn’t because of who he was fouling. Yet, Barton saw the referee victoriously flash yellow in his face for an inferior infringement. For all his indiscretions, Joey Barton is far from a model player – but he should be applauded for showing restraint in the face of such obvious provocation. Alan Shearer carrying his anti-Barton agenda into the Match of the Day studio was also unwelcome, even more so than Alan Hansen’s continual Liverpool bias.
Really, at a time when a third of the England team are hiding behind press-injunctions – almost certainly for some variety of infidelity – spare us the moral-hypocrisy about Barton. His behaviour in the past has been dreadful, but he has now been punished for it.
5 things that we’ve learned
Ashley Young will already have been on the phone to his agent…
The day Martin O’Neil handed in his resignation at Aston Villa, the future looked less bright in the midlands. Less bright, but not bleak – Villa fans could correctly have reasoned that they still had a very competitive squad, even if the manager who had assembled them had packed his bags.
If James Milner’s value to his former team is in doubt, let it no longer be so. The most apparent deficiency in Villa’s performance yesterday was the absence of a link between midfield and attack, a gap that used to be bridged by Milner. Without him, Kevin MacDonald’s front line and midfield drifted individually as two separate entities, continually surrendering possession in the chasm between them. The memory of a comfortable victory over what Bolton showed to be an extremely fragile West Ham team are a distant memory, Villa are sinking back into mid-table nothingness, or worse.
At around the same time that O’Neil walked through the exit door, there were persistent rumours that Ashley Young would soon follow on his coat-tails. Only a last-minute intervention from Randy Lerner managed to convince the England winger that the club could match his ambition, and that his future was not back in London. However, following the humiliation at St James’ Park, would anybody really bet against Young having already issued a distress call to his agent. Interestingly enough, his odds of joining Tottenham have been slashed overnight – to 1/2.
Subtle as Carlo Ancelotti’s influence is, Chelsea are better for it….
Again a slight difference, but a noticeable one. The change in Chelsea that has transformed robotic 3-0 victories in 6-0 maulings is one of enhanced fluidity. Apart from the sum of the team’s parts being regularly superior to their opposition’s, the multi-tasking and flexibility of Chelsea’s forwards has made them near impossible for most to cope with. Anchored by a fit-again Michael Essien, the front four of Lampard, Drogba, Anelka, and Malouda now seem to drift into whichever attacking channels take their fancy. Watch the fifth goal scored against Wigan, and appreciate that setting up banks of four – or ‘parking the bus’ – is really no longer a viable option in attempting to subdue them.
Matthew Upson and Robert Green both need to move clubs…
Players don’t become hopeless overnight. Sometimes a sequence of events, or a severe individual event, can afflict confidence terminally. The combination of conceding goal after goal last season, and being cornerstones of all that was bad in South Africa, is a classic example of this phenomenon. The sooner this period in their careers is bookended by a change of environment the better, both for the players themselves and for West Ham.
Andy Carroll is a future England player…
Not because of the hat-trick – there are plenty of average players that have Premier League hat-tricks to their names – but because of his link play. Newcastle’s second goal owed everything to Carroll’s age-defying maturity in squaring his back-post header instead of going for goal, showcasing his understanding of how to actually play the target man role. Like Premier League hat-tricks, there are also plenty of average big-framed players that are referred to as target-men, who show none of the qualities expected within the role. Carroll’s intelligence, understanding, and strength on the ball all add up to a bright future in not just black and white, but plain white also.
Jermaine Beckford is a huge mistake by Everton….
Little tricks and flicks that worked in League One are going to fool nobody in the Premier League. David Moyes enjoys special status given what he’s managed to do with such scarce resources, but this looks likely a black mark against his record. You can’t take a player from the lower leagues who is already in his mid-twenties, and expect him to adapt to such a dramatically harsher environment. If he ever scores a goal for Everton it will be a surprise.
EPL News 24/7
