A new era at Everton or another false dawn?
A new era at Everton? Well, perhaps not as much as we hoped. The season started with the customary draw against the newly-promoted Wolves.
The game as a whole was not as bad as the scoreline suggests, down to 10 men in the first half after a ridiculous decision by the referee to send off captain Phil Jagielka dampened Everton’s dominance on the game.
The bright spark of the early games has been the form of the Brazilian Richarlison, with two goals against Wolves and another versus Southampton in a routine 2-1 win at Goodison Park. Everything seemed rosy.
In true Everton style, the Toffees decided to press the self-destruct button.
Richarlison decided it would be a great idea to headbutt Adam Smith after being drawn in by the defender. The red card played a key role in Everton throwing away a 2-0 lead with an inept performance at the back following the introduction of the ill-fated zonal marking for set pieces. Coupled with the horror injury of Michael Keane, who had been finally finding his feet, this game was a day to forget.
As the days went on, the injury and suspension list had grown longer than war and peace. Yerry Mina and Andre Gomes, signed in the summer, had not even been on the training ground let alone the pitch.
The inevitable shocker at Goodison followed, with a lacklustre display which saw the Blues draw 1-1, and in all honesty, it could have been much worse. The only shining lights being Kurt Zouma and Lucas Digne who looked like the defenders we have been waiting for.
The team seemed to be stuck in a hangover from last season with the dreadful movement on and off the ball and the complete disregard for game management. Taking a step back, it was easy to say some of the players just were not up to the job.
Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Tom Davies, Cenk Tosun and a recently returning Ademola Lookman had looked sub-par to the say the least and to say the knives were out already would be an understatement.
On to West Ham at Goodison Park, after the international break, (which also saw fan favourite Seamus Coleman sidelined). West Ham had lost all four of their games prior to the Sunday afternoon meeting.
You guessed it, they won, very convincingly too. Individual errors had made a massive part with Digne, Jordan Pickford and Mason Holgate letting West Ham in three times to score.
As it stands, Everton have six points out of five games (three games of which have been at Goodison Park). Say what you want about Ronald Koeman but in his first year we did not lose many at Goodison and same can be said about Sam Allardyce to a certain extent. The trouble with Everton of present is that no one fears coming to Goodison.
Marco Silva deserves time to stamp his ways and tactics into our team, to even think about getting rid is ludicrous even by Everton’s standard, but we need to learn and fast. Everton have a number of players due back from suspension and injuries, then and only then can we judge our team as a whole.