Struggling Everton made to pay double penalty at Old Trafford

11 games without a win speaks volumes. If it doesn't work, then at least try to fix it!!!

This is the role of the manager. Earn your money, Mr Dyche, and take positive steps. What we are currently having to endure is appalling and unacceptable. On current form and performance, we truly deserve to be relegated.

How many on here would replace Dyche now?

Any suggestions in how to improve things?

Post break, I'd prefer to see Garner wide right and Coleman at right-back. Garner has a good delivery, which is what you need when you play a target man; otherwise, what's the bloody point???

Another defeat plays us into trouble. Worrying times.

Hopefully Gana will be fit to return in midfield at the end of the month, Garner can be moved to the right flank, Seamus can resume at right-back and Calvert-Lewin up front. Beyond that, there are very few options available.

Again today we passed up chances, and people say "Change it"!! … with what? We have nothing, he's playing with what he has.

The lack of quality is not his fault, we need to wake up, this is a team of below-standard players, and he's trying to get a tune out of them.

Leaving Godfrey on at right-back chasing the game made no sense. If Young was coming on, it had to be for him.

The stupidity of the challenges for the penalties is not something that Dyche can do much about. Ranking Godfrey and Young ahead of Coleman and Patterson is.

Get the fucking ball forward quickly, get it in the fucking box and get fucking players in there… for fuck's sake!!!

Quickly. Or we're fucked. Fortune favours the brave. Where are your bollocks?

Godfrey cannot play again for us, other than as an emergency centre-back. He's an accident waiting to happen, doesn't create, and has no footballing brain.

Harrison is a fantastic worker, but is on the wrong side of the pitch to be effective. Post-break, it has to be either McNeil or Harrison on the left, with only one of them taking the field. We cannot afford to have no threat on a wing.

The formation needs to change. 4-4-2, with McNeil tucking into the centre on defence (I have my doubts on Dobbin on that front) to provide numbers in midfield. Beto and Calvert-Lewin up front. Bang the crosses in.

Have them commit up front, rather than the "crosses to nobody" approach we've seen too much of lately. 30 crosses in sounds great. It's not great if strikers aren't committing.

Sean Dyche made his name on that tactic. I've never understood why he's not deployed it with us. We have four winnable home games to finish the season. We must win three of them, at a minumum.

Keep the 4-5-1 for the away games. It's worked more than not. But we cannot continue as we are at home, or we're doomed.

I'll add, by the way, that any talk of getting rid of Dyche is pointless. There's no manager worth paying that will touch our idiot club, there's nobody with seniority at our idiot club that will make the decision to fire him and his staff, and our idiot club lacks the resources and wiggle room within PSR to pay him and his men off.

So we have no recourse but to back him, and hope that the 3 weeks (thank God, 3 weeks of no Everton) will act as a reset and hopefully lift some of the malaise.

There have been several blatantly poor games where we should have easily won, several more where we deserved to, this being one of them. But poor tactical selections left an error-prone defence at fault and a team fashioned on workrate devoid of any inspiration or quality where and when it ultimately mattered.

I've said it numerous times, the game is about scoring goals, a combination of good tactics, leadership, decisive football and belief. On all of the above, Dyche and his team have failed miserably. Chances don't win games, goals do. United had nowhere near the chances we had but they got the rewards because a player suckered our defenders not once but twice; game over.

The old saying that a club is too good or too big to go down has been heard many times over the years; if you can't convert chances into goals, you will be relegated.

Dyche may have indeed stabilized the ship, but we are seriously holed beneath the waterline. The goals continue to leak, the captain believes in duck tape and the passengers are wondering where all the lifeboats have gone. In the distance, another couple of icebergs loom, while an enemy submarine, the Sub Premier League, opens its second torpedo tube coming in for the kill... The SS 777 hears the distress signal but will sink before it reaches us.

Thinking that lot up was far more entertaining than watching that game. In any other club, any other season, Dyche would be gone, but that lifeboat left with the owner and board on it. The music plays on and the passengers are suddenly worried...

Goodnight all.

[I can scarcely believe I have just typed those words.]

I ask because I ended up watching the first half, and then gave up and got out of the house and went to work, rather than having to suffer watching a performance that was making me very angry, if I'm being honest.

At least the kids are honest and play with loads of energy, which are two things that I felt Everton's bereft performance completely lacked today.

It's sadness.

Although I have always associated getting angry with it being because we care, there was something about today which just gave me a lot of negative anger.

I just hope the kids got through to the final!

Even if we do stay up, this annual survival dance is boring, depressing and joyless. What is the actual point?

Dyche dared to dream by playing a strong team in the cup and we ballsed that up and we've paid the price in injuries and the form of the side ever since.

The whole thing is a mega depression.

Everton's fortunes didn't improve. At one point substitute Dominic Calvert-Lewin rose to meet a header on the edge of the six-yard box, only to send it straight back across goal. Lewis Dobbin reacted and also tried to score, only to send the ball back across where it had come from, with Onana not called upon on either occasion.

It was comic book stuff but it is no laughing matter for Everton, who are in big trouble on the pitch, let alone off it.

Last week on MotD the banner in the back ground read, "Everton can't score for toffee". The media openly mocking us now, please God we have the last laugh.

I have been out this evening so my earliest opportunity to respond. I am not paid £1M+ per annum to manage Everton, so I can not claim to have the answers. However, various other contributors have had their say and many speak sense.

If you truly want my opinion, for which I am paid nothing, I would start with playing a right-back at right-back. Seamus is the obvious choice but playing a centre-back out of position makes no sense.

I would ensure that my striker is not horribly isolated and that he is provided with decent and regular service from out wide.

Neither Harrison nor Doucouré are contributing anywhere near enough so that is where additional pace and some level of guile may be added.

Yes, there are no candidates who jump off the page and Dyche clearly won't trust any of our youngsters, but he has to address the shortcomings. Give Dobbin and/or Chermiti a proper chance. Get them playing closer to the striker.

Gomes, for all his shortcomings is the only potential class act we have able to pick a pass. None of those 3 can be any worse than the current chosen crop. Find a system to make the most of our limited resources. Isn't that what a manager in any post is required to do?

We have to set up to try and win games, not avoid losing them. It doesn't need to be pretty but it does need to be planned, constructive and effective.

Let's not go out with a whimper bemoaning our lack of options. Let's fight for our lives and give our wonderful fan base something to cheer and get behind.

I don't have the answers but I can see many of the problems which are so obvious. I do know also that, at our current level, we are a disgrace to our motto… management and players.

I will go one step further: the Everton team and management have no brains. I believe the individual players are actually stupid.

There is no other way to describe their overall play. Clueless, ineffective and ridiculous decision-making.

The School of Science? School of Dunces.

Last win 2 weeks before Christmas and we don't play again now until the clocks have gone forward and the Easter bunny is making an appearance?

It's a shambolic record, isn't it?

The way I watch other teams in the Premier League, even in the lower echelon around us, they make scoring look so easy yet watch us and it's like we are trying to get out of snookers just getting a shot on target.

It's going to be a long drag of a run-in.

There's no way we'll do it now, not with 10 games remaining at a crucial point of the season, it wouldn't be fair on a replacement trying to do something with what's left of the season.

I'm not exactly Dyche biggest fan; I'm not his biggest detractor either.

As far as I'm concerned, he's another Sam Allardyce, he's a troubleshooting manager that has a ceiling and only so many strings to his bow and I think we've probably seen his maximum before Christmas with this side but it's up to him now to save this club from the mess on the pitch we are in at least.

Summer time will obviously bring fresh questions about whether we should be thinking about going in a different direction, however.

After the break, they fought back playing straightforward, determined football, went into a 2-1 lead and held on.

It was exactly the sort of performance we need, but are not getting, from our beloved Blues.

The 3-week break can be used to gel and rest the squad and improve their belief and finishing.

At the moment, in recent games, most of the opportunities in and around the box are very laboured. Too much time and too many touches needed and the chances soon disappear.

Sadly there is a lack of belief in and around the box. Man Utd were there for the taking yesterday. To concede two penalties by lazy tackles is criminal and numbing.

But unless Everton start scoring, then there's a real Achillies heel which with the off-field fiasco over the leadership and day-to-day survival of the club, could on their own or in combination, send Everton into the abyss.

I don't know where the next goal is coming from but play the available best players at right-back and in midfield. It could be time for Keane upfront.

I'm resigned and angry but it is vital as supporters we must stick together and back this squad, now more than ever.

The reality of the mismanagement of Everton FC for the last 30 years has come home to roost but the cour de grace has been set up by the absent owner and his deceased former Chairman.

Hand to mouth, Everton must now win the games they have versus their nearest challengers in the Bottom 8 and hope for a zero or low points docking for the other PSR charge.

Right now, bar miracles, Burnley and Sheffield Utd are gone. Small solace for a football team that can't score goals on a regular basis.

"I wish it was anger, but that has just about been knocked out of me. It's sadness."

And helplessness, Peter. I can, we can, knock out all sorts of recommendations about how to change things but nobody at the club is listening so it all seems a bit pointless at times (in more ways than one).

Anger, sadness. helplessness. Even the next stage, of just laughing at it all.

A bit like Les Dawson playing the piano. Can get a few bars right but then descends into a parody of what it's supposed to be all about. So bad it's initially cringeworthy, and then just laughable. Guardiola has a Steinway to play. Our "Sean Dawson" has only a battered old upright.

Link

We can all see the problems – it's the solutions that are lacking.

Is changing a right-back going to help us score more? If the right-back was Trent, I would agree with you.

If Coleman was fit, he would be playing. Patterson can't defend and Young is only just getting back to fitness.

No matter what formation or tactics are employed, it's the glaring lack of quality costing us, week after week – surely everyone can see that.

Calvert-Lewin has lost an edge, Beto is a battering ram, Doucouré isn't match fit, McNeil and Harrison have gone off the boil. I would argue that the goalie, two centre-backs and two centre-midfielders are keeping us in games.

Dyche is being paid as you rightly say to keep us up. Do you not think we have improved since Lampard and Benitez?

It's all very easy to blame Dyche but look at the bench; if Gomes is the answer, what's the question? The guy was great on loan and for the next 4 years has been average at best.

I am not saying he is faultless and no doubt he will try to change stuff but there isn't a lot to change. This 3-week break may be the thing the players need to refresh and reset.

Two Sunday league standard tackles done us yesterday, which is poor discipline. Tarkowski got sucked in by a player looking for it, Godfrey's was just plain brainlessly rash inside the box. Hopefully we will see Seamus back for the run-in…
we need him.

However, it's the attack that is the issue with this team and Sean Dyche. Maybe employ an attacking coach for these 3 weeks or until May. Just try to get some ideas and inspiration into these players. He's got to try to do something to improve things.

The biggest factor is our attacking from wide positions. Mykolenko is excellent defensively but not an attacking full-back. Godfrey is no Premier League right-back, and has no guile or capability attacking-wise. Harrison and McNeil are wide midfielders, I wouldn't categorise them as attackers.

So there you have it, the only real attacking player on the pitch week after week is Calvert-Lewin or Beto.

This wide attacking issue must be the focus of our attention to get out of this ever-deepening rut. The balance has to be redressed. Especially against mid or lower teams.

Danjuma in front of Mykolenko may work better. Patterson behind Harrison and encouraged to bomb forward may work too.

The players at our disposal ultimately may still fall short, but despite that, Sean Dyche now has to come out of his failing defensive cocoon.

I truly feel sorry for the die-hards, the eternal optimists, the never-say-die brigade and the clinically insane who can find something to cling onto.

I've been one my entire life and have been fortunate enough to have seen the legendary greats eg the Holy Trinity, Latchford, Thomas, McKenzie, Sharp, Gray, Sheedy etc… in their pomp. I've also lived through the dark days of the early '70s, and the '90s but I have to say I have never felt as emotionally divorced from this team as I do today.

The Moshiri & Kenwright era has destroyed the club from top to bottom and it's going to take someone, or something, special to save this club from itself.

The mediocrity and self-satisfaction that Kenwright imbued in the club's DNA needs to be rooted out whether we are in the Premier League or the Championship. While that stain lingers, we will never be anything other than a distant memory.

When I look at Everton, I see a club that seems to have become completely ungovernable now, because apart from constantly releasing videos showing us progress on the stadium, we don't really hear from anyone except Sean Dyche.

I'm aware it's a very well paid job, but the club is a complete shambles from top to bottom, but I suppose that's what eventually happens when you choose nepotism over talent?

Hopefully it's the last dying embers of an era we would all like to forget, “an era when the enemy was always within”.

Well done to your grandsons and getting through to the final, I hope they win that, nice to hear some good and welcome news.

God only knows what they may know, and Evertonians can't be told or will never know. But the coin has dropped. I see an air of increasing discontent and frustration. Evertonians, give their all for the club. The club must sort itself out now.

"I hate the fact I'm so invested and 30 years deep into something that brings me absolutely zero joy and bores me to tears. It's such a waste of time and I'm now so aware of it."

Over 40 years for me (I'm 51 this year) and I've become entirely disillusioned with the game.

I rarely watch a game on television now, and I even stopped watching Everton at half-time yesterday but I went to Blackburn last Tuesday to watch them playing Millwall. Although the standard was absolutely awful, and my partner was bored to tears, there were certain aspects of just being there that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Maybe it's because you see the whole picture, and are often surrounded by very passionate lunatics, but there is still something special about being inside a football stadium.

Talking to my brother at half-time yesterday, I completely understood why he was seeing a completely different game to myself, because he was at Old Trafford, and I was sitting at home watching the game on the television by myself.

Listening to The Jam singing “In The Crowd” probably explains why the stadiums are still full!

Simple question requiring a straightforward answer. No chance. The usual muddled speak which is meaningless and unhelpful.

What is wrong with being honest and clear in your replies? Given our current dreadful state and lack of real grit and passion, Branthwaite, Coleman and Pickford are the first 3 names on the team sheet. The other 8?

As I've gotten older, I've become more apathetic towards sport in general, I think. My reactions to events are not as extreme as they were in the '90s, when I was in my 20s, so it's partly an age thing as much as anything else, I suppose.

Your point about live sport versus TV sport is also true, I agree. The TV version is never the same, even to the point of opinions on performance being entirely different depending on whether you were there live, or watching at home.

I don't get to games anywhere near as much as I used to, and with all the VAR rubbish and general whittling on from pundits, the TV version of football is indeed shite now and does colour our views.

I still go to some away games, but Goodison holds way less interest for me now. I actually can't wait for them to shut the doors and for us to move to the new stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock in the hope that it changes the culture at Everton. I'm so utterly bored and frustrated with the reliance on history, Goodison, the People's Club moniker, and all that misty-eyed stuff too.

In my view, we need to move, change, evolve, modernise and actually attempt to catch up with the modern game. If we go to the new stadium and take all the blue-tinted 'istory nonsense with us, all we're doing is repeating the same old mistakes, just in new surroundings. I want a modern Everton, not a museum.

That first paragraph is a very poignant one. My eldest lives in Leeds, I went to see him a month ago and was talking with some Leeds fans, they were all of the opinion that they enjoy football much more in the Championship than the Premier League.

One said to me that he felt so much more relaxed about Championship football than the anxiety of the Premier League. I didn't get that at first but it kinda makes sense now.

Listen to Dobie Gray's version, and then Drift Away And So High. All great tracks.

The last two, proper Southern soul. Mussel Shoals I think.

He said, “No you're okay, you're just saying out loud what I'm fuckin' thinking myself!”

The game didn't get much better, we made enough chances to win without inspiring us fans to any extent.

Looking back, I know! This has got to be the worst squad of players we have ever had – and I'm going back a long time.

A large part of it is the culture in football now. Everyone wants to play like Pep Guardiola's Barcelona, with Messi & Co but they're trying to do it with Godfrey & Co.

The style and fashion in football now is keeping the ball at all costs, lots of passing, regardless of whether it's progressive, and thus football has become stale, dull, and boring to watch for the most part.

Games are so lacking in competition most of the time, and the Premier League have sold us all a lie. You have both teams playing essentially the same way, regardless of shape – you can see what's going to happen half the time, it's become so predictable that supporters are turning their heads.

Vincent Kompany is doing it.

He's trying to play like Manchester City with Burnley players recently playing in the Championship.

Sadly, I am worn down a bit with both Everton, after so much emotional investment over the years, and football generally, with the corruption and VAR and reinvention since 1992 — it is as if nothing happened before then unless Sky or BBC want to glamourise one of their current 'darling' clubs by doing a bit more history.

Can anyone honestly recall the last time our team of 67-70 (which could match any current team IMO for football quality and was way ahead of its time in formation and tactics) or the almost as outstanding '80s teams were even mentioned in the broadcast media?

Everton are in a really dark place and, although I only have various history books to review the post-war and '50s teams, since my memories are of mid-'60s onwards, I feel this is the worst ever team.

It is certainly the worst ever period in our history by a mile and, as Tony A mentioned in another post, brought about by the enemy within for the last 30 years, aided by those with a vested interest such as a well-paid manager who won zero and a rich fool who left self-interested muppets run the operation.

I wonder if Barrett-Baxendale, Sharp and Ingles ever think about where they put this club?

Everyone is doing it to some degree, and that's my point. All managers have tried to adopt the same principles regardless of the players they have and it doesn't work. It's also dull to watch unless your team is full of top players.

They just look daft half the time and end up shipping goals and losing games. And for what? Because a certain style is in vogue. It's almost a vanity thing now.

The one person at the club I have been developing a liking for is Kevin Thewell. He's doing a decent job despite all the restrictions, and he is someone I could see as part of the ‘new team'.

So it was disappointing (though not really a surprise) to learn yesterday of rumours that he is looking to move on.

Football Fans Show Team Where The Goal Is!

Brought in Maupay and raided Burnley – though to be fair, Tarkowski was a free agent and I do rate Dwight McNeil. But if Dwight had Jack's attitude, then we'd actually have a player

I wanted to give him credit for Mykolenko but no, not him. He did bring over Coady but I'd like to know why we let Branthwaite go on loan to PSV in the first place?

How did we not spend anything on Beto?? I see £25M plus £5M in add-ons.

That's it for us games wise for 3 weeks. However just the small matter of Luton vs Forest on Saturday. I guess we all hope for a draw from that one.

I feel for the lad but the pitch should be your release and I've seen it be for many players before him in different sports. There's also more important jobs where other people will die if your head isn't in it so please stop making excuses for the lad.

If it were my misses. I'd be a little perturbed she even posted it as it seems she's making an excuse for my performance. The lad seems like he's one who wants to float under the radar anyway and that put him right into the spotlight

Pull a finger out. Dale.

That's why we bought him and not one of the host of strikers we were 'linked' with. Wouldn't surprise me if we sell him before we have to pay anything!

No way we get £25M plus £5M for him if we sell after the first year.

Still need more info for me to not think this is a bad deal.

At the moment, we sell players in order to bring in desperately needed money and can only buy/loan in a way that keeps us on the right side of PSR.

I'm inclined to blame the people who have ruined us by spending seven years buying players who don't score goals, a bit more than Thelwell.

It seems better than I thought originally. But I still question the deal because it must be an inflated price because of having to pay nothing up-front.

Love his effort though and he's very easy to root for. Price tag isn't Beto's fault.

For me, the jury's still out on him. He's clearly better running onto the ball, rather than the 'pivot' that is Calvert-Lewin.

He may get better if or when we have more pace in the team. Him up front with Danjuma may be worth a go.

It makes me wonder more about Chermiti too. Is he just to replace Simms and Cannon who we were forced to sell??

But the game against Man Utd was more than even I could stomach. After we gave away the 2nd penalty, that was it for me. I knew we would not be able to score twice in one game.

I know that Dyche does not value fans' opinions, as he says 'If you are a plumber, do you know how to do my job better than me?'

However, while he clearly knows how to organize a defence and was as defender himself, it seems his ability stops when it comes to attacking play and finishing, in particular. Whatever is going on at training is clearly not benefitting our strikers.

Dyche's downfall at Burnley was inability to score goals. Perhaps the calibre of the forwards he had there is, in some way, responsible for that failing. The same cannot be said at Everton. Calvert-Lewin is a proven goalscorer, with over 20 goals in a season.

Yet at the moment, scoring looks like something he has never done before. As another poster said, if we continue in the same vein, doing the same thing, expecting a different result, we are doomed.

Perhaps bringing in a coach who specializes in goalscoring would be a smart move, between now and the end of the season. Obviously, the current coaches have not been able to progress that part of the game.

There are defensive coaches brought in to help some clubs, so presumably there are coaches who specialize in helping forwards to improve their finishing and service to the forwards.

As a sports person, I have decried the cheating, diving and feigning injury that goes on in football. It makes me sick to the pit of my stomach. But, watching Garnacho hit the floor and many others from other teams, just maybe it's time for our players to start doing the same?

I watched Kai Havertz last night dive in the most obvious way, without any contact. While he did not get the penalty he was trying for, neither did he even get booked! So if players are not going to be punished, maybe our boys need to start 'falling over' when the bootlaces of a defender brush against them.

If you can't beat them, join them. I can't even believe I am advocating this, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

I think it is glaringly obvious a coach on goalscoring and attacking play needs to be brought in. There is absolutely no confidence in the current attacking play by the players.

He's swapping one striker who doesn't score many for another who doesn't score many and the fact is neither Calvert-Lewin nor Beto are the type of strikers with the skillset to get themselves in a game and create their own chances.

Some strikers can collect the ball 25 yards from goal and curl or hammer one in the top corner or use skill and pace and strength to take a defender on.

All we are doing is swapping and isolating one striker with limitations for another with limitations.

I don't know why Beto has been here since last summer yet they haven't found some kind of pattern of play that can include pairing Calvert-Lewin and him together for a sustainable period.

Instead of that,N we've got basically two No 6s in Onana and Garner that can't create can't score, can't shoot, and Doucoure who is about the only real hope of a goal but it's got to be an instinctive finish.

It doesn't matter when the cash changes hands – except for our cash position which is precarious also.

Our forward is our first line of defence. Chasing down defenders and midfielders. Calvert-Lewin or Beto do that more than they do anything else. It's unreasonable to expect them to be chasing into corners one minute and then fresh and alert in the penalty area the next. They're covering multiples of the distance that their direct opponents are covering.

Our midfield is our second line of defence. Including Doucoure –though he does get some freedom and rewards us with the odd goal.

And our defence is purely defence, except when we have a set piece or when Tark is smashing another diagonal.

Ironically Pickford actually gets a part-time job of being creative.

Changing any of that will come at the cost of our shape and defensive record. So we don't do it.

Now, I don't even post much on here, not been to a game for a good while, and don't listen or look at scores because I know we are getting beat. It's depressing, but I will always be a Blue and have optimism.

Now I can't understand why they can't do it in a game, and the only thing I can think of is they can't handle the pressure we are under, where every game is a must-win game.

They have plenty of practice at goalscoring in training… maybe it's a psychiatrist they need to see.

We are in serious danger of relegation, with performances and results getting worse.

We played like a team already relegated against a very average team that couldn't believe the gift of 2 penalties.

Our solid defending is melting and the high-energy pressing is missing cohesion.

I'm calling bullshit on the number of shots (26) being used as stats. Most of the so-called attempts were panic crosses or passes in the box. I only wish players had the mentality of shooting when in the box.

ps: I hope we are still going to fight against the 6 points. It's still a made up, unjustified, illegal attempt to punish without rules.

We are not in administration, despite the Premier League attempting to drag the 777 Partners takeover decision in order to push us into administration.

We did not attempt to break away from the premier league, unlike several other teams that have gone unpunished over their ill-fated breakaway European Super League attempt.

Wake up and fight, Everton, we need someone to take charge as Moshiri appears to have put himself on gardening leave.

I watch all the training videos from Finch Farm. The only thing I would say is that the shooting practices seem to be just a player being passed the ball, then shooting, ie, there is no defender, even a semi-passive defender, making them shoot when being pressed or having to wrong foot or get a shot off with a defender closing.

The Finch Farm shooting practices aren't anything close to a match situation. I'm a hockey player and one of our shooting practices is to shoot while off balance or shoot off the 'wrong' standing leg. We were coached by one of England's top goalscorers from many years ago. She says her secret was to always fire off a shot so early, even if off balance, so that the keeper never had time to set themselves.

Just my observation from watching the Finch Farm practices.

Yes, you are right, it's field hockey I play (though I wouldn't mind having a go at ice hockey! 😀)

I have played at club, county, regional and Masters International level, so have had the benefit of being coached by some of the best coaches in the sport.

Yes, our goals are smaller, but so is the ball, so more accurate shooting required, as the keeper is well padded, so does fill quite a bit of the goal. Hence the need to practice being able to shoot from any angle and to shoot off the 'wrong' foot.

If you watch many of Rooney's goals, he strikes the ball very early, as our coach says, before the keeper can set themselves. But that does require being able to get the shot off before you 'feel comfortable' to shoot.

Having said all of this, it is a complete mystery to me why many footballers who train every day and are paid obscene amounts of money, are unable to use both feet?? We have 2 very left-footed players in McNeil and Harrison. Neither seem able to do anything with their right foot. Because of this, they both absolutely need to get the ball onto their left foot to do anything with it.

We lose sooo many chance to put the ball into the box or shoot early, because of their inability to use their right foot. Surely it should be your life's mission as a professional footballer to be able to use both feet. If not equally, like the genius, De Bruyne, at least be able to cross or shoot. Perhaps that would improve the service to Calvert-Lewin or Beto who are both starved of decent balls for them to get on the end of.

Re: My (and your daughter's) name. Yes it's definitely a popular one!! I once played in a team with 5 Karens!!

The most obvious thing about Everton's attack (?) is the almost complete lack of taking a chance (snapshot) in a crowded area. I watched Palmer last night for Chelsea with one shot the was flicked into Newcastle's net and a second one with a quick fast shot through a defender's legs, straight into the corner of the net.

Everton rarely try these quick attempts but want to walk the ball into the net. If you don't have a go, you'll never score!!

See it play it. Take your chance early. Don't wait for the golden moment.

It was Ancelotti's instructions to Calvert-Lewin. Stay in the box and take the shot first time.

Too many times on Saturday, we dithered and looked for a pass when we had chances.

I would love them to walk the ball in but we are a million-miles away from that happening. The main problem again is the final third strategy, no one knows how to pick a pass, make a run, pull defenders out of their shape to make space for others etc. Our running off the ball is non-existent and I think that comes from being absolutely drilled to stay in shape and remain defensively solid.

At any one time, we have a lot of tall players, yet every corner seems to be the same: hit it to the far post. Although we have scored a high percentage of goals from set plays, I think if we varied our corners, we could do even better. Maybe try a flick-on from the near post?

Apart from his goal against Spurs, it's very rare that Branthwaite heads many from corners, and he is our tallest player. Yet West Ham's tallest player, Zouma, scores from a corner the other week. Lewis Dunk had a free header at the far post for Brighton.

23 shots against Man Utd sounds impressive but the best save Onana made was when our Onana miscontrolled and then handled the ball goalwards before Godfrey missed the ball.

Forget xG. It's misleading. We create very little.

And it's being used as a measure by our manager to show his progress. Not our progress, but his progress.

And we have fans telling us he's doing a great job and that the players are failing him. Basically, they're believing what Dyche tells them.

xG models are far from perfect but they are gathered by neutral bodies and represent objective data. Whereas your opinion is clearly very subjective and coming from someone who seems to have been anti-Dyche for a long time.

Obviously xG has no significance compared to actual goals, which is what really matters, but I don't think you can just say that we aren't creating chances when that is clearly not the case.

What you might say is that we are creating lots of half-chances rather than a few really good chances. Half-chances will often rely more on a level of confidence and technical proficiency from the person they fall to and that may be one explanation as to why we have so many fruitless shots and keep underperforming our xG.

xG - across the league it generally follows a pattern. It doesn't consider anything but the pattern. It makes sense because they made it fit the pattern.

It doesn't make sense in this team. We're not creative. I don't see any argument that our best opportunity on Saturday was a miskick, handball and missed kick. A couple of efforts from McNeill that might have been belters had they even hit the target. Another one where he never beat the first defender.

Put any stats you want on them. They weren't goals and never could be goals. It's not a statistical anomaly that these chances aren't turning into goals - anomalies happen infrequently. This is what happens every single week doing what we are currently doing.

Go back as far as the start of the season when you and I started this debate. Gana hitting the corner flag isn't worth consideration for any kind of metric. It's no indicator of future success. We could put him in that position a hundred times and lament our bad luck, or we could acknowledge that it's a terrible way to score goals regularly. The anomaly was when he somehow scored a great goal. And his output reverted to the norm very quickly.

Yes nothing to argue about your second paragraph but there were times in the second half when shots were on but the ball was passed instead, maybe because, as you say, lack of confidence and pressure.

Yes, I agree, not enough snap-shots, but I still think that's down to the players 'waiting until they feel comfortable' to shoot. Standing leg in the right position etc. Instead of just hitting it off either standing leg, when you are not comfortable.

Danny at #78,

I have just posted on the McNeil thread about Ancelotti's time at Everton. I saw an interview with Calvert-Lewin when Ancelotti was our Manager. He said that he had been given clear advice to 'stay between the sticks' and in an around the box.

That was Calvert-Lewin's best season in front of goal and he got an England call-up on the back of it. So the lad can score goals and, as you rightly say, it was following Ancelotti's instructions. Let's face it, he recognized how best to use our main striker. That seems to be eluding Mr Dyche.

As for 'They weren't goals and never could be goals'. Of course they could be goals! Coleman scored from the corner flag last season. Soucek last week scored from a half chance that he struck sweetly. Anomalies happen every week. That's the beauty of football. And xG models work to account for how likely you are to score from any given place.

You're right that we didn't have many clear-cut chances on Saturday but we did have lots of half chances. I think we had something like 15 shots from inside their box. And none of them was Idrissa Gueye! Most of them were to McNeil and Doucoure who are meant to be our attacking players and should be capable of finding the corner on at least one or two of those occasions.

I honestly don't think there's a huge amount more that a manager can do with this limited bunch beyond facilitating his attacking players to have 15 shots from inside the opponents box. After that, it's up to them to step up and put the ball in the back of the net!

Yes, a bit of Jelavic would go down well now, hit it as soon as he saw it and it worked well until he suddenly dried up and stopped scoring!!

Then he started changing corner flags and running the channels, possible under instruction?

Peter Taylor and Brian Clough did okay without xG. As did many others.

However, it is no coincidence that our xG is good but actual scoring is not so good. We have very few players with that confidence and attitude it takes to actually score goals.

Who is a natural goalscorer among our midfielders/wingers? Doucoure is the closest you are seeing. McNeil rarely scores, Harrison seems like he is lacking confidence. Garner, Onana and Idrissa no.

And this is were the manager comes in. Dyche will always select the disciplined hard hard-working Harrison to, for example, Danjuma. Danjuma is the type who has got this arrogance and confidence that is needed to score goals.

So the manager will have to find the right balance in the team. High XG is useless if you only have a number of Idrissas to convert the chances!!

Although they always say "never go back".