Norwich City (h) Road to Nowhere...
The same team as Southampton, never change a winning side is what they say. But the truth about the winning side against Southampton was it didn’t start the game until the 70th minute when Alex Iwobi came on.
I had real mixed emotions at 2pm, playing the bottom of the league, surely we need to go for the jugular? We needed pace, power and intensity and got the absolute opposite. This was Marco Silva’s Walter Smith vs Middlesbrough moment.
When that horrible rat Paul Ince scored the third goal in that game, there was no coming back for Smith. Although the players seemed onside, the nucleus of the team were ageing, slow and just not able to do what the manager wanted them to do. He was deeply unpopular with the supporters, and had a disconnect with a lot of his players. Sounds a bit familiar doesn’t it?
Walter Smith played slow, turgid, unimaginative football. His players were old, pedestrian and devoid of attacking intent. This isn’t quite the depths of the current managers has sank to, but it is heading in that direction.
Silva said after the game that Everton didn’t play quick enough, Everton were afraid to play football. The reality of his team selection shouldn’t need to be explained to him, Sigurdsson, Schneiderlin and Tosun, the spine of his starting 11 had zero pace, mobility and most alarmingly got zero intensity. Silva has had the best part of 2 weeks to plan for this game, Norwich pretty much down to the bare bones in defence, a chance to climb the table and get back to back wins, and boost confidence.
To be quite frank the non event of the first half was bossed by Norwich, the stand out players were Norwich players and the clear cut chances fell to Norwich players. The game was stretched already, end to end in some respects, but with Norwich dictating the tempo. That’s just not acceptable. Everton’s performance was not acceptable, the manager’s decision not to make positive changes at halftime, completely unacceptable.
We’re all football managers in our heads, we all second guess the manager, we all are capable of making better decisions. Why can’t the manager see what we can see? The clear and obvious changes at halftime were Iwobi and Kean or Iwobi and Calvert-Lewin. Pace, power and intensity... and the opportunity to get in behind the worst defence in the league rather than play in front of them and go absolutely nowhere.
By the time Iwobi and Calvert-Lewin came on we were 0-1 and showing no signs of life, being embarrassed on our own pitch, £20, £30, £40 million pound players made to look like they were the ones promoted out of the championship last season. Aimless punts up field, running down blind ally’s, very little penetration through the middle of the field. And then the final incomprehensible decision whilst chasing an equaliser, the substitution of a right back for another right back. It’s not as if Silva didn’t have a striker that scored 2 goals in midweek with a point to prove sat on the bench.. it was one of those surreal moments, a moment that will always be linked to Silva’s tenure at Everton. Just what was he thinking?
Norwich had four 1 on 1’s with Jordan Pickford by the time the game was over, between Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal and Man Utd at Goodison last year he had 2. A brilliant comment on Toffee TV this week after watching Howard’s Way was that their team should be the standard that all future Everton teams should aspire to. I’ll tell you something right now, not one player in this current team would get remotely close to those players. I would be shamed if I was one of those players tonight, even those on the bench. Before Sigurdsson gave the ball away for the the second goal, the faithful were mostly on their way, quite rightly so. The release of that glorious film just underlines, hilights and compounds just how far our club has allowed itself to fall.
I don’t want to hear platitudes, rallying cries or lip service over the next week until the Leicester game. We deserve decisive action from the senior management of this club. They either replace the manager or they make a public statement that backs him. We need clarity, not a week to week ‘must win’ game scenario.
Today’s game has confirmed what the vast majority of Evertonian’s have been thinking, under Marco Silva this club is on the road to nowhere.
As best you can, keep the faith 💙
By Matthew Barry
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