Elston Gunnn

This is such sad news for you and your family, Shukes. I hope you will be able to comfort each other through this heartbreaking time.

Three good plays there — Gomes’s pass, DCL’s touch-lay-off, and McNeil’s shot. Maybe only 3 good plays all match, though.

Have to go 4-4-2. Patterson out (on yellow), Keane at RB (for awhile), bring on an attacker, one of Danjuma, Dobbin, or Beto.

Sometimes we’re just so boring to watch.

Look at that “pass.” And yet another. And a third with a minute or so.

Had only 2 men, barely, in the box.

Too frequently we just cannot make a basic pass. McNeil’s to DCL an example. That wasn’t a difficult pass to lay on for DCL.

I have seen this sort of PK a few times. Often fails. It reminds me of a now-common “shot” in basketball in the U.S., especially college bball. It’s very common for a player, especially on a breakaway, to take the ball to the hoop for a thunderous windmill-slam-dunk, more and more frequently, one-handed. Showy, self-indulgent, look-at-me. I refer to this as a “thunder-dumb,” as sometimes, too often, the preening player actually misses what should be a sure 2 points. My response is invariably, “Sure hope we don’t need that 2 points.” This basketball play is stupidly violent. Onana’s was stupidly over-clever. “Look at me.” Seems likely this will haunt him. Hope it inspires him, instead, to excellent play from now on. Want to see relentlessness, not cleverness.

Hard to tell what strongest would be tonight, as we don’t know about availability of Mykolenko, Doucouré, Coleman, maybe others? Presumably Branthwaite comes back in, for .... whom? Gana unlikely to replace Onana, right? Play both of them? What sort of formation? Sometimes McNeil looks tired, but he’s playing well. Is it clear what “strongest” means for this match?

Wasn’t fully fit for a long time, apparently. https://www.evertonfc.com/news/3819142/surprise-factor-behind-mykolenkos-fine-form-revealed

That FA Cup tie would be Thursday 4 Jan, not 3 Jan.

Doucouré’s energy is always impressive, but he’s made 4 poor crosses today. Is Harrison still on the pitch?

Fair point. It may be that I don’t give him enough credit because he’s also our top goal misser. Clear first-half missed attempt in the box, given the perfect pass to his feet, is too common from him.

Doucouré is DCL’s main goal-scoring support, but he misses so many opportunities that it’s a major, major problem. Consistently, once or twice per match, the camera shows him in close-up, hands on head, disbelieving he missed. But in fact it’s easy to believe, because he misses repeatedly. Great energy, clearly one of our best eleven, and perhaps there’s no better position for him. But for us to stay up, he has to score some goals. If the most consistent Doucouré-sighting is his all-too-common “disbelieving hands-on-head,” we’ll continue to be in big trouble.

I think you’re right about Young, but I also think others — including but not limited to me — have said the same. So if you’ve been shouted down, you’ve also been shouted up.

Hope so. But once again, Dyche refuses to pull Young after first-half yellow.

Prefer Young out, Patterson (or even Coleman) on. And Doucouré’s charging the ref, getting the expected yellow, was too foolish.

Gana as our goalscorer — jeez.

Unfortunately, there’s yet another example of Doucouré’s most common “move” in front of the opponent’s goal — hands on face, disbelief he missed another great chance. Great energy, but just not a dependable goal scorer as ACM. .

Just to make sure I understand the potential AFCON problem and solution —- Isn’t it fair to say that Gana Gueye and Onana have been playing the same position (“that space”), if not always in the same way? If yes, then Onana would be filling Gana’s space, as in fact he’s already been doing as the recent starter over Gana. The Onana/Gana position is roughly “controlling” midfielder, with both advancing and defending responsibilities. Doucouré, otoh, has been consistently an attacking midfielder (ACM), who’s often nearly as far advanced as DCL. (Which is precisely why we all wish he had a more consistent shot. Thus, Gana’s absence would deprive us of an important first-off-the-bench plug-in player ..... on those strangely rare occasions when Dyche actually uses a sub. Edit — It may be that Matt’s referring to Doucouré doing the job Dele would do, if ever he gets healthy. Rather than Doucouré replacing Gana. Sorry if I misread Matt’s point.

I thought Gana would have been a good sub, with his relentless energy. And I did agree with the numerous calls for more subs. Here’s what I hope would be a reasonable counterargument to yours. 1) A fair number of us thought it was broke, or at least breaking, in the sense of tired legs, in the face of WHam’s desperate attacking. 2) The starters did play together, and often pretty well. Had several — say 2, even 3 — subs been brought on by the 80th minute, that would still have meant the first-choice lads had played together the vast majority of the match. 3) The call for subs was more (though perhaps not entirely) about tired legs than poor play. All of the midfielders had good moments, but McNeil especially looked tired as the second half wore on. Overall, although I’m not a big fan of Gana, it just seemed so obvious to me that he should have been subbed in.

We could use Gana’s energy now.

6 am PDT, 9 am EDT, I think.

We’re going to be run ragged, so I hope Dyche subs in Beto for DCL on 60-65 minutes. Probably a match for Gana to come on pretty early, too, as he’ll run everywhere.

Just seeking some clarification here ..... Is one element of this emerging consensus that Gana will be on the bench? Presumably moving Onana into the sitting DCM role?