Zoo 2.0

38 minutes ago, Bailey said:

This isn't a rumour for us as such but Butland is apparently available for around £8-10million. 

When he was in the premiership I thought he was in the quite big group of non elite keepers but also not terrible. I'm not sure how he has done since his injury for Stoke however I am guessing not too great but its quite clear he hasn't wanted to leave for a while.

If a new challenge perks him up that fee will double. Would anyone take him to play 2nd string to Pickford with the realistic chance that Pickford might continue to fuck things up?

Before he moved to Stoke I would have taken Birmingham's arm off for him but not now. He was actually dropped for a spell after some horrendous mistakes and whereas he's earned his place back, the fact that nobody has taken a punt on him (even in the Championship) shows that he has very much found his level. 

He could have been so much more, so it's a shame really but signing Butland would only be a continuation of the problem we have now - Pickford is bulletproof as there's nobody to replace him. 

If we sign a goalkeeper, it needs to be someone at first-time level to at least replace Jordan when his form dips, IMO we should be looking on the continent.

Unless you have sat in a boardroom with Brands, Ancelotti and Moshiri/Kenwright then you cannot even start to guess who our transfer targets are. Every window (like most clubs) we are linked with quite literally hundreds of players and I'll guarantee that 90% of them are absolute bullshit. 

Have we missed out on any of our targets this summer? Perhaps, but I keep seeing people moaning on here about us missing out on players when there isn't a shred of evidence that we were ever in for them in the first place. 

Unless someone has bugged the meeting room at Finch Farm then it's all speculation and it feels like Groundhog Day when I make the same post each January/Summer when the same folk get up in arms that we haven't signed 16,428 new players. 

Brazilians have a long history of heading to Portugal as it allows them to speak the same language (Brazilian being pretty much a dialect) and at the same time play in Europe. The Portuguese league is also the shop window for players to move from (Renato Sanches, Raul Jiminez, João Félix) so it makes sense in terms of his personal career although with the amount of noise surrounding him I had hoped that he would head straight to the Premier League or La Liga. 

I had to send my home shirt back, nothing to do with Hummel but whoever had put on the Premier League badge had put it right up on the shoulder. 

I like the new home shirt, but it's so obvious that corners are being cut across the board. The Premier League badges used to be stiched into the shirt, yet are now stick on and the badge is the same. I get that companies want to get a product out as cheap as possible but the quality has got worse and the price has stayed the same.

I'm part of the problem, as I can't help buying the home shirt every year (the wife treats me to one each season and I'm not breaking that tradition) but it's frustrating none the least.

Just now, Romey 1878 said:

£5 would be beyond my wildest dreams if we could get it. 

Same.

19 minutes ago, Bailey said:

Not a link at all but his name has been floated around the forums... Jack Grealish allegedly valued at £80mil by Villa. Wow.

Grealish will go for insane money, he's English and absolute quality - not to mention that he's young so is only going to get better. If we had an endless pot of money I'd take him in a heartbeat but unfortunately he will be snapped up by one of the Manchester clubs. 

Not that it's this thread but I'm worried about the Zaha rumours, I'll be absolutely mad up when he signs elsewhere because he's the biggest case of "big fish, small pond" I've seen. Not what we need, especially when he will carry a similar fee as Jack. 

2 hours ago, Palfy said:

100%, Goodison is becoming the graveyard for managers who thought no job was to hard for them.  

One of the more stupid comments I've seen reading through the board. The Moshiri era has been filled with managers using Everton as a promotion, as opposed to thinking that a job was not too hard for them or stepping down to come here as you've hinted. 

Silva was managing Watford, who are now in the Championship with his previous clubs being Hull City, Sporting and Olympiacos. Hardly on the level of us. 

Allardyce had a great tenure at Bolton, but had been bumbling around relegation fodder before coming to us - again, at the time that he joined us, we were like winning the lottery for him. 

Koeman was the same as Silva, did poorly with Valencia and was managing a Southampton side that was not on the same level as us. 

Ancelotti has been the only manager I'd describe as being an out of this world appointment. Moyes, Martinez, Koeman, Allardyce and Silva all stepped up from their current employers to come here. 

I'd honestly like to hear what reasoning you have for such a negative view, unless it was just having a moan for moanings sake?

On 17/07/2020 at 11:42, TallToffeee said:

So we've heard from Boris that we'll be back relatively early next season in October...  Only going to be 20-30% of ticket allocation - this going to be a lucky dip or will season ticket holders get preference??

source - https://fanbanter.co.uk/government-reveals-when-fans-can-return-to-stadiums/

Season ticket holders should get priority, there shouldn't be a general sale until they can accommodate all of the regular matchday group. 

Not allowing someone to go the game that goes every week, but allowing someone to go whenever the feel like it is completely the wrong way around, so hopefully common sense is used when the stadia is reopened. 

I'm pretty sure masks will be mandatory (and probably no bars open to reduce crowds) but that's fine by me. 

Thank the heavens that I can drown my Everton sorrows with Formula One. George Russell qualifying in 12th (then bumped to 11th) made my day. I'm really hoping that if Mercedes replace Bottas they do so with young George. He looks every bit a future star. 

Ferrari continuing to be shite is a fantastic sight, as is McLaren being back where they belong at the front of the pack. Lando and Carlos have had a great start to the season. 

I just hope that Max can have reliability so that we can have the Mercedes/Red Bull battle that was robbed of us last season. 

King LH to win of course, on pole with an insane lap yesterday. 1.2 seconds ahead of the field which is remarkable, no matter how hard you try to knock it. 

I've seen traffic cones deploy better offside traps than that. 

3 minutes ago, Bailey said:

I absolutely refuse to accept that this will be the mentality of our football club. If it is we won't win anything at any point. Any player going into or during a game that accepts losing isn't one that I want at the club. 

Agreed, I didn't say that we should accept losing, simply that there is a clear difference between having something to play for and not. 

There is no battle, we won't make Europe and we won't go down. This is the perfect time to experiment in preparation for next season when we actually have something to play for - not to mention that we are playing every three days or so which is bound to take its toll against what is a wafer thin squad (quality wise).

8 minutes ago, badaids said:

There's nothing to play for at all, so I wonder if Carlo has just said to get through these games, not to get injured and try a few things out for next season.  The players are hopeless, but it's the only way to explain the ambient trance like performance of this team the last few games.

I said way back when the league restarted that these games were nothing more but glorified friendlies for me, obviously want to win but it's the perfect time to try new players (Gordon, Branthwaite) and new formations. 

Europe is and always was a pipe dream and realistically we were never going to go down. We were set for mid-table and remain so, I'll reserve judgement on Carlo/Everton until we're into next season and actually playing for something.

Just now, Palfy said:

Bring all the youngsters on, they can show these over paid big time Charlie’s what passion is.

That post has aged well mate. 

Defensively we're OK, but the lack of quality in midfield is shocking which in turn makes the two up top totally insignificant. 

Signing two centre midfielders is an absolute priority this transfer window as it's been our obvious Achilles heel since the Premier League restarted. 

On another note, see a few people are already kicking off about Carlo. Cringe as fuck. 

Jordan Pickford isn't the best thing since sliced bread and has a lot to improve on, but some of the criticism that he gets (unfortunately mostly from "Evertonians") is laughable in the extreme.

Kean/Bernard for Sigurdsson please. 

Zzzzzzzzzz. 

Not been this bored watching a game of football in a long time, zero creativity from either side and that goal sums up the first 25 minutes. 

I'd take John Stones back here all day long, was gutted when we sold him. There were some flaws in his character but a very good player in there that just needed to be moulded. At 26 he's in the prime of his career and if we bought him could arguably get 4-6 years out of him. 

An all-English defence of Holgate and Stones would be brilliant, with Kenny on the right and Digne on the left. Don't forget that Michael Keane has been revitalised since Project Restart and has looked very, very strong under Carlo. I know I'm the minority but Mina I really rate too, he offers us something else. 

Stones, Holgate, Keane and Mina is a healthy batch of CB's for me. 

4 hours ago, Matt said:

I wonder if the sound waves on the keepers kit represent something or whether it’s just to look cool 

and we have 2 different home colours for shorts and socks? Have I just be oblivious or is that new?

We've always mixed white and blue shorts with the home shirt, but I think they've probably only sold white as part of the kit on the store. 

Whenever we play at Old Trafford for example, we always seem to play in full blue as opposed to white shorts/socks.

Edit: I've just seen that the sound bars are Z-Cars too, which is a nice touch. 

Just now, Romey 1878 said:

I wasn’t expecting it to be tbh. They rarely are real but they got close!

Look up!

Simple design, but that's always the best way. The iconic Hummel logo across the shoulders as expected with white shorts and socks. The Cazoo sponsor is great too, in the sense that it's not some horrendous logo that takes away from the actual design (like Chevrolet and United). 

Happy with that. 

Tottenham were absolutely shite today against Sheffield, I know Mourinho always seems to do badly in his third season but it seems to have already started going tits up - they were on the wrong end of an appalling VAR decision, but can have no complaints about the result. 

Lloris was and still remains one of the most overrated goalkeepers on the planet (in the same group as Kepa and Courtois) and the defensive partnership of Sanchez and Dier was totally ripped apart on a constant basis, I'd be disasapointed if DCL and Richarlison can't cause them problems. 

Harry Kane was proper isolated up top, hopefully Paulo Keandini can have another monster performance and keep him quiet as if we do, and take care of Son (their only other outlet) then we'll take the three points. 

So badly want to give it to Anthony Gordon who was excellent but it's Keane again for me. He's looking more like the player who showed all potential at Burnley (and more) which is fantastic to see. I thought that he did really well, but it was only when Carragher commented that he'd had the most aerial interceptions in a league game so far this season (12) that I was assured of how good an afternoon it had been. 

His interception from Pickford's brain fart literally saved us two points and going to 2-2 so early would surely have swung momentum into Leicester's favour and make it 3-2. 

I can't praise him enough. 

22 minutes ago, pete0 said:

VAR are a joke, how does that decision take nearly 3 minutes? Any other team and the pen today is given within 30 seconds easily. Can't help but think they look for reasons not to give us decisions. Thought it was gonna be spurs all over again the longer they made us wait. 

Not sure if you're watching the West Ham / Chelsea game but it's just as bad there. 3 and a half minutes to determine that Antonio (who was lying down on the floor) was offside by a head. 

Agree with you about Spurs, thought it was a stonewall penalty but would have bet my mortgage they wasn't going to give it.

Just now, nyblue23 said:

Is Virginia not legitimate competition? Honestly asking. I just know how highly touted he was coming over from Arsenal.

Unfortunately not, went out on loan to Reading and was dropped after a string of poor performances. 

He was highly rated at Arsenal (their fans were going mad about him being let go) so I wouldn't write him off just yet, but it seems as though he's not at Premier League level currently.