Season › 2011-12 › News

Preparation was key, says Neville

Phil Neville believes Everton's fine victory over Swansea City was down to meticulous tactical planning and preparation, after a scouting mission by David Moyes: ?The gaffer came down a couple of weeks ago and watched Swansea play against Manchester City and he was impressed."

?They're a really difficult team to play against, they're brave and they play out from the back. We had a game on Wednesday, but our thoughts turned straight away to this one and we had to prepare very hard tactically.

?Our game plan was to press them as high up the field as possible. They had a 10-15 minute spell where they passed through us, but once we sorted that out, I thought we suffocated them, and by the end we had nullified most of their goal threat and could have gone on to get three or four ourselves.

?The way that Swansea play, they will have a period where they are on top. That period was in the first half, and if we had conceded in that period then we probably would have lost the game. We had to hang in there, and just before half time we came into it and got a bit of encouragement.

?We felt at half time like they were there for the taking. Bearing in mind that this is their first year in the Premier League, and probably only (Wayne) Routledge and (Scott) Sinclair have experience in the Premier League, then we knew our experience would count.?

Quotes or other material sourced from Liverpool Daily Post

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