Season 2011-12 Fan Articles

Outstaying Your Welcome

By Ged   Dwyer  ::  20/03/2012   58 Comments (»Last) David Moyes has given out enough clues over the last 10 years to show that there is something very suspect about his management style. But somehow he has been given the benefit of the doubt by too many Everton supporters time after time.

His falling out with numerous players, inability to clinch signings, wasting millions on certain players, awful substitutions and overall tactics, numerous humiliations on the pitch have left me in no doubt he is not up to the job as Everton manager, despite finishing high in the league table on several occasions.

A couple of times we have been close to having a decent team but Moyes has shown he has had no clue how to make the final adjustment to push us on and we have then slid backwards.

Apart from a couple of purple patches, the standard of football played during his reign has been the worst I have witnessed in 40 years of watching Everton, and at times has been absolutely appalling.

But last Tuesday night was beyond the pale. For an Everton manager to put out a weakened team in a Derby was totally unforgivable and surely now only the ultra deluded can want him to remain as manager of our great club.

His logic is and was all wrong. Anyone who has watched the game for any reasonable length of time knows there are certain fundamentals you don't mess with. An unchanged team breeds understanding, continuity and confidence. Moyes doesn't know this.

One change in a defence means there will be a disruption of understanding in the defence. Two changes means there will be probably be too much disruption, especially in a Derby, and when a solid performer like Distin starts to struggle you know this must be the case. Moyes doesn't know this.

Bringing in two players with little match practice is a recipe for disaster in a Derby as they will struggle with the pace of the game and it is unfair on them. Moyes doesn't understand this.

Two or three changes for any game is risky but for a Derby it is a real gamble but six changes is suicide. Moyes doesn't know this.

If we had played our strongest team, given Liverpool a game, maybe even won a point or three, we could have dented their confidence further, instead of boosting it, and the outcome of their cup tie may well have been different as the pressure on Dalglish was growing a pace. This was far too much for Moyes to work out.

And, after 10 years, Moyes didn't know or didn't care that a Derby is too big a game to mess about with. His plan was doomed to fail, didn?t work, and all he managed to do was generate an extra game for the team, with cup progress even more uncertain.

Moyes likes to harp on about how he looks after his younger players.

His management of Rodwell has been awful. Putting earlier seasons to one side, and with the scapegoat for many fans last season transferred to Arsenal, Rodwell was pitched into the fray and almost immediately he too suffered harsh criticism from a certain section of our supporters but, to his enormous credit, he played through this (despite a ridiculous sending off), kept his head down, worked hard and after several excellent performances, notably City away and Utd at home, got himself into the England team on merit, and won over the boo boys.

Unfortunately an injury stopped his progress and then Moyes did what only he can do. He didn't just play Rodwell once when not fully fit, away to West Brom when he had to go off, he brought him on again in the very next game causing Rodwell to be sidelined for weeks.

Not content with that he then brings him back for the derby when he?d had little match practice and the critics have returned leaving Rodwell with the task of re-establishing himself again and winning over certain out-of-order supporters again. It?s just poor management of a player.

Rodwell will leave at the first opportunity, just like Arteta and the Evertonians who have given him stick will then deny they were ever on his back, just the same as with Arteta.

Ross Barkley could have been a sensation for us this season in midfield. But, while our centre midfield has struggled on the creative side all season, and again on Saturday against Sunderland, he is nowhere to be seen.

I'll throw in the handling of Anichebe too, whose confidence has been destroyed by Moyes, who has incessantly played him out of position.

And of course playing people out of position is one of Moyes?s favourite tricks... and he seems to have no idea that this can hamper a young player's development. Even though Barkley handled it well, he was played out of position on his debut for the club.

At the start of last season Rodwell had just had a great pre-season, Moyes could have started with an excellent centre midfield trio of Rodwell, Arteta and Pienaar, which would have had some pace, a ballwinner and plenty of creativity. But instead he chose to ignore it, instead playing someone who wasn?t match fit who had no pre-season, and supporters were left scratching their heads as to why we had yet another poor start, and that chance is now long gone. We are now left with a ponderous centre midfield which lacks creativity, creates no space for the two wide players, and is unable to win a midfield battle with any team including Blackpool and Tamworth and we have to endure the team holding on to slender leads like grim death, relying on a stretched but solid defence.

Each substitution he made in the Spurs game made the team worse, he took off the three players who had been the biggest threat, and not for the first time it was like the Alamo in our penalty area for the last fifteen minutes of the game.

There has also been a bandwagon this season for Moyes to play two strikers. When will the penny drop that we don't have the quality in midfield to do this and Moyes doesn?t have the tactical know how to play this way? Remember the Bolton home game fiasco?

No doubt the usual suspects will have a go at me for saying this but the game is up for Moyes. He is not a good manager for Everton, he does not know the Everton way ? even after 10 years ? and I hope and pray Spurs offer him their manager's job when Redknapp leaves... although I think they will have too much sense.

As for getting to and getting past the FA Cup Semi-Final, I have no confidence in Moyes managing this and we will see the team chop and change more and more over the next few weeks as the wheels fall off again. And although Pienaar can't play in the cup, he'll play more games than Drenthe who needs games to become more of a consistent performer.

With or without money, the last 10 years could have been so much better with the right person in charge. This club has more than money can buy (as 1984-85 showed), a great history, great support, great facilities, good youngsters coming through the ranks, and it did have an ambition few other clubs had, but Moyes has talked us down for years, and diminished our standing almost single handedly.

Please, no more nonsense, no more "In Moyes We Trust". The game is truly up. He doesn't care or know what it means to be an Evertonian. Last Tuesday proved that. When the Everton manager becomes Liverpool?s best weapon, something is very, very wrong.

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