“Right lads, that was a decent enough first half…let’s make sure we keep it tight for the first 10-15 minutes and don’t do anything daft that might give them encouragement / get their crowd more involved than they already are…”
Maybe that’s not verbatim, but I’d suggest that was effectively the instruction being relayed by Eddie Howe to his charges as they departed the Stade Vélodrome changing room at half time on Tuesday night. Unfortunately, and as we all painfully saw, that plan lasted a grand total of 19 seconds. NINETEEN FUCKING SECONDS!!!!
Now if truth be told, I’m a big fan of Nick Pope – yes, his feet may only be skilled in the art of standing up and I won’t deny that I’m one of the c.50k that need a new pair of TENA every time the ball is played along the deck in his direction, but over the past 4 years his shot stopping ability has won us more points than he has cost us…now however we have reached the stage where his capacity to brainfart is costing us points and results on an increasingly regular basis.
For West Ham read Brentford, for Brentford read Marseille – we are now at the point where he surely has to come out of the team?
While Eddie’s “Rotating the goalkeeper position isn’t something that I want to do” comment at this morning’s presser doesn’t fill me with confidence that he will do the necessary, tomorrow is his opportunity to show the doubters that he CAN make the difficult decisions where his perceived ‘favourites’ are concerned, because if I was asked to sum up Newcastle United’s recent away form, I’d likely go with “One step forward, 40 Nick Pope sized fucking steps backwards”.
Anyway, onto Everton away…
We will arrive at the shiniest stadium in the Premier League with Everton still basking in their first win at Old Trafford in 12 years, despite the fact they played 80+ minutes with 10 men after 3ft 1” Idrissa Gueye decided that bitch slapping his 6ft 3” colleague was the way forward – whilst you have to credit Moyes’ men for coming away with the win, I’m still of the opinion the victory was earned more as a result of the sheer incompetence of the opposition manager and his now legendary inability to change or tinker with his formation mid-match.
So far, the stadium that sounds like it was named after a character from Downton Abbey has not been quite the fortress that the Scouse Mackems had hoped it would be with Villa, West Ham and Spurs all leaving with points in a record that reads W3, D2, L1 – and although it’s still very much early days, I’d go as far to suggest that in the medium / long term the move will prove detrimental to Everton; whilst wooden seats and restricted views were shit for visiting fans, Goodison on its day was an intimidating place for away teams to play football – gobby, loud and aggressive home fans right on top of you is not what you want as an opposition player. The lessons from West Ham’s move from the Boleyn to the Taxpayer Stadium have seemingly not been learnt…
A Glimpse of the Future?
The first WhatsApp message came a few weeks ago. A work colleague unexpectedly had a spare ticket in hospitality for Everton’s first match in their swanky new waterfront stadium. A three-course meal, free booze. A chance to recce the new ground before our visit at the end of November. Was I up for it?
Tuesday night aside, we must remember that we head into the fixture of the back of our best Premier League result of the season – last week’s victory against Manchester City saw us back to our aggressive, front foot, high pressing best and you just know all was well on Barrack Road last week when Bruno, Sandro and Joe cause a flood of Mogadishu based opposition e-fans to descend onto social media with cries of ‘Thugs’, ‘Anti Football’ etc.
The midfield aside, however, I cannot be the only one to believe that the catalyst behind last week’s return to our ‘intensity is our identity’ best was the reintroduction to the starting line up of Hall and Livramento; within 5 minutes of Sam Barrot getting the match underway, the impact they had on our ability to play 10-15 yards further up the pitch was plain for all to see – they simply have to start on Saturday evening. Should Howe inexplicably choose to once again select Dan Burn at left back – particularly against the impressive, pacy Iliman Ndiaye – serious questions will need to asked in respect of his ability to manage some of the more established members of his squad.
In effect, the same can be said of our forward line where Harvey Barnes has proved that currently he is worth two of Anthony Gordon – on current form, our favourite Scouser doesn’t come close to displacing our top scorer on the left flank, and let’s be honest a bench that contains amongst others Gordon, Burn and Pope would not be one to be sniffed at.
A first Premier League away win of the season tomorrow night would see us right back in the mix at the right end of the table and would provide a much needed away-day confidence boost with a trip to the Mackems on the horizon – if Howe can grow a pair and make the required calls and the players take to the pitch with the same mentality as they do SJP, I think we nick this 2-1.
Into these, United.
Lee Forster @LeeDForster
