With Everton facing off against Newcastle in their boxing day fixture up in the North East, we decided to see what Football Manager 2016 thinks the result will be.
We began a simulation of the 2015/16 Barclays Premier league season and simulated up to the Newcastle game, seeing just how Roberto Martinez team would be able to do in the season.
Everton’s only signing from the simulation was Angel Correa of Atletico Madrid. he Argentinian has featured 15 times for the Blues, scoring 3 goals. Striker Romelu Lukaku has 8 goals in 18 appearances.
The Merseysiders would go into the game off the back of wins against Norwich and Leicester, the game against the Foxes being particularly impressive, the Blues winning 4-0. Although, Leicester are sat in 12th place, rather than table toppers in reality.
Onto the Newcastle game, the Blues would fall to a 2-0 defeat with early strikes from Aleksandar Mitrović and Ayoze Pérez. Everton’s highest performer would be James McCarthy with a rating of 7.8, Angel Correra behind him with 7.5. Fabricio Coloccini would come out as MOTM in a game that realistically seen Everton control the game with 56 percent possession, but could only put 2 of their 8 shots on target.
In reality, Everton will be looking to climb up the table against Newcastle, who have looked slightly more dangerous in recent weeks, turning over Liverpool and drawing to Aston Villa in a game they probably should have won. With the recent set of bad results from the Blues, Everton are desperately in need of getting back to winning ways if they hope to qualify for European competition this season.
