Everton.
January.
Good, barring one minor (ok, an absolute travesty) at the beginning of the month.
I left the last article with an air of positivity going into the transfer window.
I can’t have an Everton article without the negativity for the start off point. Leicester, the Premier League champions, came to Goodison off the back of a very indifferent season. The dizzy heights of last season will never be forgotten but more than likely never be repeated. I took to my seat with the thinking that this would be an easy passage to the next round of the cup.
The first half was as flat as a pancake as we have been accustomed to in the past few seasons. The second half sprang to life when Gerard Deulofeu made his cameo, he got his assist to put us ahead, that’s when the fun started.
Gerard had thought it was job done and decided to go missing for the rest of the game, Koeman took off one of our better performers Ross Barkley for the ineffective Arouna Kone. Oh, and the fact that Musa waltzed through our back four like wasn’t there. Not once, but twice to end our FA Cup run at the first hurdle.
Koeman rightly called out the board to get the cheque book out. What we have seen in recent weeks is Koeman is a ruthless man, he basically told every Everton fan that the team that went out on the pitch vs Leicester had been, one or another, not good enough.
Then, by magic Morgan Schneiderlin was signed for the fee of £20m plus add ons. This begged the question, had we parted with the money at the beginning of the month, he could have played vs Leicester and played instead of the lacklustre Gareth Barry….but anyway enough of the bad chat.
Man City – Home
I have seen us have blinders against this lot, I have seen us be absolutely embarrassed by a Shaun Goater influenced Man City. But this game, is by far the stand out of the year so far.
Gareth Barry preferred over Schneiderlin due to lack of match fitness raised a few eyebrows. Enter Tom Davies, the Ketwig Kaiser as he is affectionately known by the Goodison faithful to lead us to a remarkable 4-0 win.
Goals from Romelu Lukaku, Kevin Mirallas, Tom Davies himself and the other January window signing Ademola Lookman sent Goodison Park into raptures
Perfect counter attacking football, solid defence (starring Mason Holgate) and a midfield driving into the box at any given opportunity was the downfall of Man City. They will be aggrieved they never got given a pen at 0-0 when Joel’s clumsy tackle brought down Raheem Sterling in the box, but lets face it, who cares? Did they care Sterling’s cross last season was over the line in the EFL cup semi final? I rest my case.
Not forgetting the importance of our diamond, who has been the most talked about Everton player this year for all the wrong reasons. Ross has been given a new lease of life with Tom Davies next to him. It shown he has matured, he is thinking before acting and looks to be enjoying himself.
Taking nothing away from the rest of the team, special mentions to Leighton Baines, Kevin Mirallas and Joel Robles, but the two scousers in the middle of the park have given the crowd something to be proud of in recent weeks.
We followed this up with a hard fought 0-1 win at Selhurst Park, which is never an easy ground to go to, with another starring role for our scouse duo. Seamus took his goal with some style and deserved the MOTM award he got. Now, I have been Seamus’ biggest critic over the past few years due to the fact of his inept crossing and his non existent defending skills over the past few years.
In this game, however, he took it by the scruff of the neck and drove forward with purpose reminisce of Seamus 2011-14 and smashed a shot into the roof of Palace’s net. Not mentioning this was in the 87th minute!!!
We followed this up with a 1-1 draw at Stoke, which maybe we should have took all three points when Tom Davies was denied by a great save by Lee Grant. We can take positives again from this game – Davies is getting better every game, Robles is looking more assured and Morgan Schneiderlin, in his first start, looked very assured.
Bournemouth then came to Goodison, with the home faithful expecting a confident victory spearheaded by Romelu Lukaku.
They got that, for just the first 45 minutes. The Toffees took a 3-0 lead, with Lukaku having a hand in all them before collapsing early on in the second half.
Bournemouth fought their way back to 3-2 before Everton then pulled away to 5-2 with Romelu Lukaku completing his hat-trick and getting another for good measure. The Cherries then had one last sniff of a comeback with an Arter goal late on but Ross Barkley rounded off the win with a simple finish.
Five wins in the last six games, with no cup competitions (sob), has sent the blues into overdrive. Can we get Europe?
The answer is yes, we can.
The current bunch are on the roll no doubt. Little disappointed that we never added a striker to the ranks and maybe another centre half, but looking at Lookman and Schneiderlin, they look like the real deal. The main positive of the window was of course the deadwood being moved on. Niasse, Cleverley, Gibson & Oviedo (for actual real English money) and to be fair, Deulofeu needed a new lease of life. It has shown Koeman is not afraid to get rid of the players that are not pulling the weight clearly does not pity fools.
For the moment though…..Let’s believe!
