Hello again. Have a good summer?
There’s a quantum-ish element to the atoms that exists between football seasons which seemingly change behaviour when you’re paying attention to them, compared to when you’re not. I chose to not pay attention to “the gap” and it’s flew over so quickly that it makes me lament giving up beautiful weekends of nothingness. For every season we are presented with a choice: to Everton or not to Everton. And season by season we provide compelling proof of the chimp mind that evolution gifted us misjudging the risk/reward decision part of our brains that’s meant to ensure our survival. Or perhaps it’s just collective masochism.
Real progress this season would not be discussing Everton survival at any point, either in relegation or existential terms. An Old manager, New owners, a Borrowed superstar and a futurama stadium on the banks of the royal Blue Mersey should hopefully bring some luck to the renewal of our vows. The new stadium musings are for next week, though.
Like many of the finest arts Everton are subjective. How I appraise them at any given time is likely to 180 degrees different to how many other Evertonians appraise them at exactly the same time. I’m approaching this season with a little more enthusiasm than the last way-too-many-seasons, yet see a team with a bigger right wing problem than that scruffy cockney on Twitter scranning Little Chef back into profit and shouting BOSH to disaffected simpletons. If I see the right wing problem then I’m pretty sure David Moyes and the overpaid people tasked with this in their remit see it too. Which leads me to think there’s a wider plan which may include waiting for the people they really want, at a price they think offers value. But then I probably expected that with Steve Walsh and Marcel Brands so who really fucking knows, and that’s the pertinent point, really.
Everton have been relatively precise in their signings so far which **suggests** a strategy. Good thing too as an almost unprecedented squad upheaval was thrown on them this summer by virtue of a dozen players out of contract, a symptom of the chaos and flux preceding in the seasons before. Whilst it’s a challenge both operationally and financially, the half full cup appreciator would point out it’s also a really good opportunity to clear out the burden of many previous managers and make a new era squad really yours. There is pertinent risk with a few of the players signed for what they can be rather than what they are, but that’s the trade off on seeking value and future profit than Schneiderlin, Bolasie, Mina, Walcott, Gbamin, Tosun, Sigurdsson, Allan and Doucoure signing for way over two hundred million pounds and yielding no return in sales. One benefit of continued abstract failure is that we got a front row seat for how not to run a football club in the modern era, which should temper “it’s not your money lad” and “we want Moshiri lad” when such urges pop up amongst us. Give me incremental growth that reassures me his time it’s gonna be alright.
That shouldn’t stymie ambition as a healthy Everton should always have ambition. It’s just that demanding NSNO isn’t a Jedi mind trick that instantly transforms the club into a time portal to April 1984. We got ourselves in this current situation by hasty untamed ego spending, the way we get out of it is good strategy executed methodically. That’s gonna take some patience and dry crotches. But your Everton journey is personal to you, and no internet tit should be able to tell you otherwise. Less so the ones that pat you on the head saying stuff like – oh I don’t know – lads, Everton are absolutely tiny compared to the footballing institution you think they are in your heads. Three decades without a touch of a trophy, four years circling the drain at the bottom of the league, no European footie to offer. Most foreign footballers have only a passive knowledge of Everton in the same way we know little about Espanyol. However right now, today, Everton should feel good with all that’s going on and the opportunities in their grasp. That most precious commodity in football/life called “hope” should be prevalent amongst Evertonians. Even if it’s signalled with caveats or enthusing over the size of calves.
This first fixture allows us to travel decades back without the need for a DeLorean as we head to Leeds for a Monday night fixture that screams fuck off Everton. In a sort of multiverse twist this journey back does comes with not just one Biff but multiple biffs, as those crossing the Pennines get to experience the people and culture of Leeds.
@Leeds, a place where a man can be a man and the bounty of free speech runs from village to person to pub to politics. Leeds is the type of undiscovered utopia JD Vance dreams of until one of its large unassuming males asks him if he’s “wearing eyeliner because you’re a tranny”. Leeds, where they turn Lynx Africa around t’other way on the supermarket shelves. Leeds where the most popular wallpaper is a Sierra Cosworth XR4i poster. Leeds the number 1 sales per capita for hair gel for the 42nd year running. Leeds, where a a headlock is considered foreplay. Leeds, the jewel of the Stone Island empire. Leeds, the epicentre of paganism. Leeds, come drink ten pints vomit in the river make a pass at any female within ten metres fight her Orc order a rotten kebab and walk home naked in the pouring incessant rain because closing a city off in his own echo chamber of exceptionalism invokes devolution to our basic inner chimp state. Leeds, God’s country.
I hope it shines through that I like Leeds and it’s because of a simple reason, authenticity. Leeds is comfy in its own skin amongst a smorgasbord of copy and paste try hards pervading this island. I really like the people I know from there and any brief time I get in their city, apart from at the game but that’s just pantomime. They will ruffle feathers and make me doubt these words, but I’m pleased to see them back up. They’re a grand club of English football and add some flavour to an increasingly nondescript generic over priced footballing pie that’s served on our respective plates. TheLeeds plate being a chipped Union Jack ordered from a Sunday magazine plate, with Farage holding a pint as its centrepiece.
@They’re signed a fair few players after learning the gap between the Premier League and Championship is creeping to an uncompetitive chasm, caused by corporate greed being a terrible custodian. Richard Masters a perfect superficial identikit example of corporate greed – stated recently that he’d like to see a more competitive relegation battle, which is akin to Trump stating he’d like a fair kinder America. Same in both scenarios we have neither a) the peers to hold them accountable or b) the fans/voters that can see, or want to see, through them. And the corporations want it all, take what was affordably yours, repackage it, market and raise the price. Where’s your sweet shop jars full of sweets now? On the aisles packaged and marketed into a corporate owned product at four times the price. Where’s your football now?
When I find myself using lemon sherbets as a metaphor for the ruin of football it seems a perfect segue into Everton really. Before I do I want to say I spoke to a mate who lives in Leeds last night and he said the whole city is on fire with excitement and vigour for the new season, and that made me smile. That’s the power of football, the working class game of the people which gives identity, pride, tribe and the power of collectivism. That collectivism is the antidote for corporatism, our enemy isn’t each other, it’s those exploiting us. So it’s a whole heart I wish that Everton utter snake Leeds on Monday with the most shithousing performance ever witnessed, result snatching so disgusting it makes me want to vomit over my cat (I don’t have a cat) and then a giant undetected meteorite flattens the ground at approximately 5.50am so Leeds never ever make the mistake of of being excited to play Everton again the fucking cheek get the fuck back in your box, lads.
So Everton, with a few new signings to bed in and a couple of compulsory injuries to fret over rush into the new season. The fragility of a squad is always exposed by absence and so we will get a first hand glimpse of this in a competitive fixture (easy get out to dismiss a meek pre season) on Monday night. If Mykolenko is out then it’s gonna cause a big rethink as the young lad Adnan isn’t ready and Branthwaite is out too (a concerning trend), meaning either McNeil or Coleman at left back which is as good for any left wing as a Sir Starmer. That’s a Moyes problem though and it means there’s little chance in me trying to second guess the team.
Grealish might be the name most are talking about this week but I find myself more enthused about K-Dewbs as he just looks like someone cooked an Everton recipe to taste. He should up our ante on front foot football, work like a smited wasp wafted away from an ice cream and play some of that silky socs. Cringe over, he’s the type of plug and play signing that will instantly lift up the others we need. Grealish too but I need to see how he fits in around N’Diaye – not the other way round – as N’Diaye has been 80% of the reason I watched Everton for the past year. Fitting them, the beautiful little shithouse Alcarez, McNeil and a potential new right winger will be a welcome ponder for both Everton manager and fans this season. Enjoy it. Hope it yields a much better Everton to watch.
There’s still very blatant gaps at right back, left back cover, defensive midfield and probably striker, so we’re in the ol’ quandry of wait to get the right signings at the right price v spew August’s points. Depends where you sit on that scale to how you’ll think about it, it’s less than ideal really so rather than caveat I’ll just hope that this expensively assembled exec team can have that repetitive issue fixed by future windows. A fully equipped and bedded in raring to go Everton on first day would be a sure sign of progress for me.
Like the start of any new season/venture/journey/relationship/phase of existence it naturally invokes aspirational goal setting, as belief in a better future is a powerful mindset for us deeply flawed homosapiens. Even if being content in the present is much healthier, but I want to close on a flourish. Evertonians are a perceptive parish who realise what’s at stake here, and the improvement/distance needed to go before they have a worthy Everton to pass onto those they love. We’ve been suitability burned by this before so the wild untamed optimism and belief of 2016 has transcended into the pragmatic expectation of 2025.
Everton avoided a catastrophic, existence threatening relegation in the previous four years via the fans agitating and supporting, dragging a listless Everton over the line in conjunction with short term new manager bounces. It would be pleasant to remind those fans how weekends – outside of summer – really can be enjoyable. Nine months to go.
What’s our name?