james_clarke

I think it is ludicrous to have a pop at Moyse when we have so many players out injured. Its not as if we are missing a couple of squad players either

We have been without our best defender, best midfielder and best CF for the entire season then you add our Captain and our only other playmaker to the long term injury list and its not really rocket science as to why we are struggling

 

Any side in the world would struggle with the amount of long term injuries to key players that we have

 

Felli is suspended by the way!

i'm sorry mate but i think moyes is due as much critiscism as anyone else in this crisis, i think his tactics and substitutions have been poor this season and some of his signings are not taking the club forward namely fellaini.

ok we have key injuries but moyes knew about this before the season started but still never bought a creative replacement for arteta and just decided that he would play long ball until arteta is fit! i've always been a fan of moyes but i'm really starting to doubt whether he has taken us as far as he can

Im going to say this here as i have no idea where else to put it. Does anyone else feel like we could have missed a little trick by missing out on Lorik Cana? ok he started slowly, but my god he would have been an ideal replacement for Carsley. Sunderland got him at a bargain price and he has an engine that has no limits, that guy is a machine and currently i feel that Everton are way too soft in the middle of the park. I wouldnt care too much against the big teams playing a 4-5-1 if there was someone in the middle, that the players can trust will keep big game players quiet. Cana did that against Aresnal, he stopped Fabregas playing (not many can say that). £5m for a quality player and someone who opitimises the 'Everton Way', was lost to a club with seemingly higher ambitions? Cana would have been a great addition and could have been the type of player to help ease our current slump by clearing up all the shite.

totally agree with u mate but he doesn't suit moyes' versatile policy as he onlys plays centre mid whilst heitinga plays anywhere this is probably why we didn't sign him (also he's on about £80,000 a week i believe!

under current circumstances do u think that moyes' 4-5-1 system is working with the current players he has at his disposal?

myself personally think it is failing big time as he is playing numerous players out of position and the team do't seem to have any shape or drive at all. ok we are missing are main creative forces in pienaar and arteta but moyes has still persisted in the same system that only works when these players are playing. also in this system fellaini and cahill cannot play together and its cahill who is suffering most, being asked to play out wide or deeper in midfield. on top of that he is playing the likes of gosling who is simply not good enough yet and rodwell who still needs time to develop into the player we all know he will be.

i feel a decent formation for the moment would be 3-5-2 wingbacks system as it best suits the players we have in the squad and woiuld allow us to play our strongest 11 every game. my team would be:

what do u think?

God help us ! is this supposed to be the thinking mans forum ????? oh, I keep forgetting, its half term isn't it ! yeah it must be that Steve Round fella giving them all wobbly knees

agree with you here mate some serious tripe getin talked here.lets have a look at the current injuries

arteta-cruciate ligament, freak accident

jagielka-cruciate ligament, fell over again freak accident

anichebe-knee, result of a bad tackle from nolan

osman-foot, bad tackle in training

pienaar-knee, bad tackle at pompey

vaughan-knee, happened at derby not at everton

yobo-head, not sure how he done this but i'm sure everton's training methods would not injure yobo in the head unless they practice kung fu in training

neville-knee ligament again freak accident

yakubu-bruised heel (before that ruptured ankle anoteher freak accident)

baines-calf, simple strain (the 1st injury so far that could be linked to training methods

bilyaletdinov-calf strain, happenned against benfica

possibly cahill and heitinga now also who were both injured against bolton. all this shows that we have simply been unlucky with injuries over the past few years added to this we also have alot of injury prone players on our books (i.e saha, osman, vaughan,) we are suffering injuries alot. it is ludicrous however to suggest its down to training methods that these injuries are happening!

what a joke

we'll be lucky to get anythin out of this baines out aswell, 11 players unavailable! very strange defence 3 players playing out of position (or not their preffered position!)

regarding the team tonight i would prefer:

howard

hibbert rodwell distin baines

gosling felliani cahill billy

yakubu saha

think this would be our strongest line up against a tricky opposition, personally i wouldn't like to throw hibbo in at cb against the quality they have

could see that comin the fans up there have no patience. here's one 4 you, who had the best record against the top 4 teams in the prem last season?

a certain relegated boro

i must say altough i haven't been too impressed with our start to the season somebody pointed out to me after the wolves game we have't actually lost in 7 games and we've only lost 3 in 13 games. this doesn't sound like a bad start considering the absence of key players and the new lads still trying to settle in the squad/league.

however what i have noticed is we have't been able to 'steam roll' teams into submission like last season, where we seemed to destroy teams below us and we also had a good record against the teams competing with us

on top of that my biggest worry so far this season has been moyes. i have always been a fan of davey and i felt last season he was finally coming out of his neagtivety and naiveity in tactics, but this year we have taken a step back and his tactics have been poor especially his substitutions.

hopefully in a few weeks we'll start to kick on and get more points on the board to challenge the top 4!

ronnie moore only missed out on playoffs by 1 goal last season and was then sacked even though he never spent a penny! barnes comes in no experience at that level , half the 1st team leave and he brings in a load of rejects and unkowns, bound to fail.

it is no coincidence that peter johnson is now an active member on the board this year and majority shareholder! what a wanker he is!

then again him and tranmere are probably made for each other

When I've seen him at RB I haven't been convinced to be honest. I think he looks a lot better at centre back.

 

Of course he needs time to settle. Moyes may not have even bought him to play at RB?

 

I can remember reading an interview where JH said his best position was holding midfield.

i could see JH playin there aswell mate as his passing was head and shoulders above neville's. this would also rodwell the time to develop naturally instead of overusing him at such a young age

DM admits it was a mistake...

 

...the manager also admitted he'd taken a gamble in throwing on Yakubu and Jo in search of a winning goal.

 

"I don't think (my decision) helped us. I think it was a poor decision by me, we lost our shape. You always look at yourself first and I didn't think today that worked."

i take my hat off the to the man, not many managers will admit to their own mistakes but moyes has stood up and done just that. altough osman and billy didnt play great they are always likely to pop up with something (like the goal) at the moment i don't think yak and jo are looking up to the pace

can't believe nobody has mentioned the substituions from the match yesterday.they were awful! osman and billy had just started gettin into the game and moyes decides to take them off and put 3 strikers on, effectively playing into stokes hands. after this we had no width or creativety in midfield and resorted to lumping the ball upfield which the 6ft 5 stoke defenders could have dealt with all day. on top od that the three strikers didn't once close down or cause any problems for the stoke lads when they were on the back foot.

moyes should have taken rodwell off (who had a terrible 2nd half,the worst ive seen him play) and dropped felli deeper to put the yak alongside saha, at least then we still would have had width to supply the two upfront!

hibbo proved once again today he wont give up his place without a fight, solid all round from him today

excellent performance today from jonny. he defo looks like a CB and not a RB and his distribution today was fantastic, couldn't see him and jags playing together though so maybe when he is back heitinga could push into the holding role as he looked decent going forward aswell today

Everton fans are so fickle 99.99% of the people on this board spent the summer calling him crap and one good game and he's being compared with Jags?

 

He has no pace, no height, his positioning is poor, he can't dribble and he can't distribute.

 

He looked good against a poor European side that on another night with our first team playing we would've destroyed. He looked good because yes, he does have a brilliant tackle on him. But in the modern game that isn't enough.

 

Good squad player for cups, Europe and weaker premier league teams. Nothing more, nothing less.

i take it this is a dig at my post but i must be in the 0.01% section on this board then mate and i could prove that with past posts about the right back slot and hibbert, and as to comparing him to jags i said his tackling ability was as a good as his which u have just agreed with!

i agree with what u said tough he is a decent player but only for lesser prem games cups and europe

90% of ALL cahills goals have come while Artetas been on the pitch. Tell you something.

only a couple of weeks til the main man is back aswell, have u seen these two gettin interviewed aswell they just take the piss out of each other

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/premier_league/everton/article5542325.ece#

hibbert is probably the best tackler at the club maybe with jags a very close second. his timing on one on one are brilliant but he has always suffered with his distribution and he often gets targetted with his height. i think he is a good defender but i think moyes has now realised that to take us to the next evel we need someone with a better all round ability hence the signing of heitinga and neill. he will always give his all and i can't see him leaving everton even if he isn't gettin a game regular as he is blue through and through

i think tim has done a decent job back at centre mid altough he is much better playing behind the striker. i think the fact he is that good in that role people expect him to be that good centre mid but he cannot be due to his defensive reqiurements. hopefully felli can finally get to grips with playin deeper and so tim does play behind the strikers.

is it just me or does cahill seem to play better when arteta is in the team, they seem to have a good understanding with each other

Adam Johnson= 1st division player

the lad couldn't get in the team in the prem and its not exactly he was too young as he's 22 now, he's too lightweight and altough skilful lacks tactical awareness. you could argue that he didnt get a game in the prem cos downing was there but i don't rate downing so if he can't force him out the team then he aint good enough for us.

on the point of billy how the fuck can u rate the lad after only playing a couple of games! unreal some blues fans the lad will take time to settle and with the squad we have now moyes will not just throw him at the deep end he will blood him in slowly. if that means playin osman ahead of him from time to time then so be it!

not bad really could have been one of top 4

vaughan got m.o.m for derby vs crystal palace on his debut but couldn't score. the derby fans are very excited about his signing and hopefully he can the games and goals to give him the confidence to have a good go at breaking into moyes team. as said by previous ppl osman came back a much better player from a loan spell at derby and i also think when victor is fit he should be sent out to the championship aswell

quality that vid clip shows the banter in the squad and credit to neville this lad lad could mean he won't find his way back into the team

lets hope this spurs the kid on to make it pro seein what can happen if u don't make it. also it just shows that not enough is done when players are let go by clubs at a young age, their whole lives have been built up to be a pro footballer and then when they are dropped they just fall on the scrapheap and don't know what to do with themselves!

think its still early days for hallam as i didn't realise he's still at school. hopefully he'll be knocking on moyes door within 3 years. btw i read somewhere he was let go by citeh at 13 and he was a centre half before he came to efc. lets hope he does make it just to show that shower what they missed out on!