Elston Gunnn

Keane with a howler, so howling you rarely see one that bad.

As Allardyce said this week that Rooney needs to get in the box more, I assume he’ll be well forward of Schneiderlin and Gana. No more deep lying playmaker for Rooney, presumably.

And there it is - Schneiderlin and Gana, together again.

I would be pleased to see Klaassen and Vlasic get on the pitch, but very surprised if either gets substantial minutes. Vlasic seems to have disappeared during Allardyce’s tenure. I don’t get it. I’d guess Allardyce still somehow hopes to be our manager next season, and thinks his only chance is to finish the season well, getting to 8th and challenging for 7th, even if we come up just short. After all, our final 5 fixtures are all winnable, theoretically. Weak teams, but also desperate in most cases. We’re more likely to see the Schneiderlin-Gana duo than Klaassen or Vlasic. I’ll guess ....... Pickford Coleman Keane Jagielka Baines Schneiderlin Walcott Rooney Bolasie Tosun DCL Second half subs - Gana, Davies, and then Niasse if behind, Funes Mori if ahead

Lucky to take a point. Unlucky not to take 3 at the end. Or maybe it was simple incompetence all match long.

4-4-2 with Rooney # 10??

Probably a 4-2-3-1, with Rooney lying deep, Davies getting forward in the middle? I suppose any of Davies, Rooney, and Gana could get forward, but I hope Gana stays back. Let Coleman and Baines get forward, too. Not Gana, please.

We’ve had 2 must-win matches in our last 4: Palace and Brighton. Each came at a moment of deep gloom, Palace after the Arsenal total disaster, when Allardyce set out what was essentially a 7-2-1 formation, only to see Arsenal glide past our porous, confused defensive set-up on their way to laughably easy first-half goals. Then the Palace win gave us essential breathing room. But 2 dismal away “performances” brought back a foul mood surrounding the club at least as deep as after Arsenal. Another must-win at Goodison, marred only, if at all, by Rooney’s penalty miss. We’re in good shape to avoid relegation, and it’s even possible once again to look up the table to 8th, even 7th. In fact, given that 6 of our final 8 opponents are mediocre to poor, one could plausibly argue that we should finish 7th or 8th. But only 2 of those 6 are at Goodison, so to finish strong we will have to take points away against opponents themselves desperate to avoid relegation. I don’t expect to face another must-win match, but if we take not a single point from our next 4 matches, all difficult for different reasons, the gloom will return. Especially if we are humiliated by Liverpool at home. It will be dismaying if a month from now we’re psychologically, not to mention practically, reduced to thinking, “Well, surely we can get to 40 by beating either Newcastle or Southampton at Goodison. Or at least a point from each of those. That would get us to 39. We’re probably safe.......” We’re probably safe. Probably no threat to get to 7th (or 8th). Likely to finish this deeply disappointing season an unsatisfactory mid-table underachiever. I’ll hope for a miracle, 7 points from next 3, win, draw, win. This thread disappears, Liverpool falls to 5th........

I hope to see Coleman and Baines along with 2 of Jagielka, Holgate, and Funes Mori. Want to see Rooney deep lying with Gana, but strongly prefer Rooney getting forward as passer-attacker, Gana mostly staying back. Keep Davies on bench, to replace Rooney in second half if (likely) necessary. Walcott on right, Sigurdsson middle, probably Niasse on left, with Tosun up top. Want all 4 attackers in the box over and over. But ...... whoever starts and whatever formation, we need fierce energy from the opening whistle. Fierce. Energy. This match is clearly our best chance in our next 5 matches to take 3 points. Blow this best chance at 3 points - a draw is a bad result today - and we will be in a nosedive toward a relegation battle in our final matches. And the utterly abysmal atmosphere surrounding this club at this moment will thicken. It’s already poisonous. We’re in a momentum slide, and it will either be stopped or propelled downward in this match. If these players don’t play with mad energy from the beginning, the foulness affecting this club will envelop Goodison. Today can either lift our spirits or get very ugly.

A 6-pointer in terms of finishing top half of the table. That’s the optimistic view. The realistic view - given the utterly foul mood enveloping almost every aspect of the club at this moment - is that this match represents our best chance in our next 5 matches to take 3 points. Fail to take all 3 points against Brighton at Goodison, the players and managers will be booed walking off the pitch, the mood darkens even further, bad momentum isn’t arrested, and we could still be sitting on 34-35 points heading into our final 4 matches.

This is a definite concern. But we’re at another bad momentum point, needing - I would say desperately needing - 3 points on Saturday. Although 3 of our next 5 matches are at Goodison, 2 are with Man City and Liverpool, so Brighton represents our best chance to get to 37 before our final 4 matches. I’d be nervous to still be sitting on 34-35 points after these next 5 matches. Our central defense has been embarrassing. There’s no reason to have any confidence in either Keane or Williams. So it seems to me that 2 of Holgate, Jagielka, and Funes Mori should start Saturday. Funes Mori seems as good as any of a limited set of uncertain choices. One good thing about Funes Mori is that he’s probably more likely than anyone in the squad to score on a header.

Hoping Funes Mori and Baines get healthy soon. Want back 4 of Coleman, Holgate, Funes Mori, and Baines rest of this season. Admittedly Holgate and Funes Mori haven’t played with each other, but Williams-Keane pairing is shockingly poor. Funes Mori may still be a red card waiting to happen, but at least he is a threat to score on a header.

Williams out for how many matches? The more the better.

Williams yelling that the corner was going to be an outswinger. It wasn’t, and he was absolutely daydreaming. Keane at fault, too, but Williams played that one like an idiot.

With the leaked lineup, I assume it will look something like this .... Pickford Coleman Williams Keane Baines Gana Rooney Davies Walcott Sigurdsson Niasse

Commenting on Bailey’s superb post-match analysis on the CP matchday thread, Hafnia made these important points: “Gana indeed needs to be given the license to roam and tackle but needs a mentor.... Rooney is growing into his deeper role, without doubt.” I doubt anyone on TT likes the Gana-Schneiderlin setup, so if Allardyce starts that pair (and a predominantly defensive team) at Watford, TT will explode and probably shut down the internet. As we need attackers, I am tempted to prefer a Davies-Rooney deep lying pairing. But I should resist that temptation, as Davies must be allowed to get forward. So Bailey’s analysis and Hafnia’s follow-up persuade me that our most balanced attacking lineup looks like this — Pickford Back 4 Gana Rooney Davies Walcott Sigurdsson ST I will continue to worry about Gana’s, while welcoming Davies’s, roaming. So Hafnia’s point that Rooney can/must “mentor” Gana is worth more comment from Hafnia and others. Back in December I had a friendly dispute with SteveO about positioning. I think we came to agree that Rooney’s best position was deep lying playmaker (SteveO’s designation - call it DLP for short). Wonder now whether there’s a consensus on TT that Rooney can help all of Gana, Davies, and Sigurdsson in this DLP position?

Are you able to access your Gold Pass account? I can’t get mine, even though I’ve had no trouble up to now, have seen several matches. Not today. You in with no provlem?

I assume the leaked team sheet is accurate. Unless Kenny is injured, I’d much prefer him at LB. I like Niasse, but prefer Tosun, and frankly would prefer 2 strikers, Tosun and DCL to start. We need attackers, goals. Remove Gana, play Davies as main DCM. Mangala, no idea. Attack, attack, attack. Pickford Coleman Keane Mangala Kenny Davies Rooney (DLP) Walcott Sigurdsson Tosun DCL I think we have a decent chance at 3 points today, but I’m more fearful than hopeful, even against a weakened opponent. A dull performance today, even an undeserved point, and we’ve little chance at points the next 2 matches. Although not mathematically must-win, psychologically it is.

I hope this works. But I worry about this. Especially given the story mentioned by nutmegwolf on the Allardyce thread, about a possible “troubled locker room.” Although I concede this is rumour, it rings true, or close enough to be part of what seems a foul mood surrounding Everton right now. The only thing that will slow our dispiritingly bad momentum is 3 points on Saturday. Maybe we could take some relief from a good performance and, say, a 2-2 draw. But another dismal performance and we’re on the verge of panic. We’d have no confidence going to Watford and Burnley. We have to stop, at minimum slow, the momentum slide on Saturday. And we need an attacking lineup, no Gana- Schneiderlin. Five attackers, and I’d prefer 6.

Until this morning I had read only the OS text version of Allardyce’s postmatch comments, which, significantly, left out his outrageous statement about “writing this season off as quick as we can.” Admittedly, he did phrase it weirdly, by adding “by staying in the Premier League.” I have no idea how the players will react to his refusal to accept any part of the blame. Surely they will not have missed his self-exculpatory reference to the irrelevance of formations and systems. We have a confident prediction in a new thread that we’ll reach 40 points in our next 5 matches. In a normal season, such a prediction would be reasonable, as we’d normally think we should take 6 points at home to Palace and Brighton, and “should” win one of the upcoming away matches. But Allardyce’s half-truth analysis of what went wrong against Arsenal seems more likely this week to deepen the gloom around every aspect of the club. We’re in a vey bad place. Anyone reading Allardyce’s comment is going to focus more on “write off” than on “staying in.” Most will be offended by “write off,” and will not be entirely mollified by the addition of “staying in.” They will think “staying in” is a cynical attempt to balance “write off.” As I posted yesterday in the relegation thread, we’re in danger of a disastrous downhill momentum moment. Allardyce’s write off blunder increases the danger and adds to that momentum. Lose to Palace and the momentum gathers speed, write off looks like the plan, staying in becomes a dogfight. I hope he doesn’t write off Palace, and the season, by playing 7-2-1 again.

From after the Southampton defeat, Everton took 14 points from its next 6 EPL matches, a wonderful period, even if the football was uneven. On the eve of the holiday fixture list, who any longer needed such a panicked thread as this one? The holidays were unkind, football-wise, the beginning of what has become a full 6 weeks of gloomy football, leavened solely by the 3 points against Leicester, whether deserved or fortunate. The gloom is darkest now, the darkest it’s been since Southampton, so that 24 hours after the pathetic Arsenal performance by manager and players alike, Everton fans are in a murderous mood. I know I am. Pretty much universally, we saw it coming at the exact moment the lineups were announced yesterday. I labled it a 7-2-1, and decided after 5 minutes of play that it was a 9-1. Others of you offered ominous descriptions and predictions, justified almost immediately as Arsenal players laughed their way to 4 first-half goals. It seems reasonable, not unhinged, to feel contempt for the manager, the owner, the DoF, and more than a few of the players. Is it reasonable, or unhinged, to think we are in a relegaion battle? I myself feel a bit of both. It’s unhinged, in that we’re on 31 points with 12 matches to go, many seemingly winnable. All things being equal, why not predict we’ll end on 45+ points, mid-table, disappointing but easy-safe. That’s actually what I expect, or would, if things felt normal, equally worried and hopeful before eachn match. But things don’t feel anything, in any way, hopeful. Neither yesterday’s loss, nor Allardyce’s self-serving, not-my-fault, comments, nor the players’ individual and collective effort yesterday, nor the creeping and now suddenly ubiquitous and deeper gloom - absolutely none of that bespeaks anything in the cosmos of hope. So while I expect - truly - we’ll stay up, I feel foolish just now thinking that way. My near and intermediate term fear is that there may be a substantial carry-over effect from the multiple aspects of yesterday’s stunning defeat. I worry about downhill momentum. Very specifically, I fear we might fall several spots down the table after our next matches, of which we have but 3 over the next 4 weeks. If we lose next Saturday at Goodison to Palace ...... good heavens how could we expect to stop the downhill slide away to Watford or Burnley? I’m willing to say it’s just a little too early to panic. I’m also willing to bet that 38, possibly fewer, points will see us safe. Yet nothing feels logical or calming about Everton today. It all feels embarrassing, pathetic, chaotic, ugly, gloomy, sour, nervous. We’ve become a laughingstock, we know it, and we think it’s deserved. Are we in a relegation dogfight? A normal, discouraging loss away to Arsenal would not justify overwhelming gloom. But yesterday and the aftermath feel as if the Leicester result was a false dawn. Dark mood, dark days all this coming week. The typical enthusiastic pablum that appears on the OS from manager and players - “We’ve got to come together, show our character, blah, blah, blah” - won’t do, and likely will simply further infuriate us/me. Is Palace must-win? Since relegation is our worst football-imaginable prospect, and since taking anything in the 2 away matches following a loss to Palace is unlikely, the answer is yes.

Can’t disagree that it’s a shambles. But the sourness to come in the immediate aftermath of this “performance” and result could last through the spring. In that case, bottom 5 and relegation battle beckons.

Has to make 2 changes at half. Guess he needs to save one in case of injury, though playing with 10 couldn’t be much worse. Don’t know why I’m even thinking about second half changes, as the only good thing he can do is apologize for his gameplan today. No blaming players, though they deserve plenty of criticism. But he has to take total responsibility, so as not to destroy the season with this result.

I thought it looked like a 7-2-1. But it’s more like 9-1. And already a failure. 1-0.

I’d take a point no matter the score, and will guess most on TT feel the same. But my view is that we have a better chance to take a point if we put more attackers on the pitch. Maybe at 75 minutes?