Martinez pleased with Kone's progress

I recognise that he cannot come out and say, "Sorry, lads, he is just not good enough." – But, when he clearly is not good enough, it further undermines his credibility to say he is pleased with his progress.

Three times on Saturday, good attacks were squandered when Kone kicked the ball straight to their defenders, generally over a distance of about 10 metres. It is true he did receive the ball quite well a couple of times.

His work rate is not good, he hesitates, his instinct is not to chase, he remembers he has to, and always arrives just to late at ¾ pace. He shitted out of a challenge on Saturday, and just compare the differing impact Naismith had in the first five minutes after he came on...

I do not hate Kone, I am not picking on him, I am trying to be accurate. I am developing a truly unhealthy dislike for Martinez, even beginning to like Brenda more... sorry, well, maybe not.

He's shown us he isn't very good!

It appears we are now safe from relegation, which to me means Martinez is staying. The thing is, he will be tasked to improve the side in the summer but, if he likes Kone, the striker's position probably won't get any attention or money. When players like Ings and Austin might be available, we should be in the market.

1 goal. Against Newcastle which we still lost. Wow.

What the hell does that mean??!!! As opposed to a player who is very important in terms of what the team DOES NOT need on the football pitch? Or a player who is not important in terms of what the team needs on the football pitch?

Seriously, I've never known anyone to speak such absolute nonsense. I would seriously hope that a player on the pitch is needed on the pitch. That would seem to be step one in selecting a starting 11.

I can just picture the conversation
Bobby: "Do we think a keeper is important and needed on the pitch today?"

Assistant: "Well if the opposing team gets a shot on goal we might like to have a keeper in there".

Bobby: "Good point, Howard starts. Do we think we need Defenders?"

Assistant: "Well, the opposing team will more than likely try to score a goal, going back to the previous conversation about the need for a keeper. So in my professional opinion yes, defenders would be important in terms of what we are trying to do on the football pitch. Plus, who would put midfield pass it backward to if we don't have defenders in there?"

Bobby: "That is phenomenal thinking. Can't believe I didn't think of that. So if we have a keeper and a defense, do we think a striker is really important to what we are trying to do on the football pitch? It seems like he would have to play it through the midfield in order to pass it to our defenders. So couldn't we just skip Kone?"

Assiatant: "excellent point. How many Barry's can we start?"

It's sad to say after almost 2 years, but the jury is out on Kone. Let's hope he stays injury free and has a good pre-season.

He blew his chance to show us what he can do last week, and was appalling. Did we buy him as a sort of living crash test dummy for the medical and physio teams to practice on? It sure wasn't for his silky skills or devastating scoring ability.

Martinez has to be judged on his signing as well as results (bad enough), and apart from Besic he hasn't done very well in that department. Lennon is on loan, keep him if we can, but he brought in Atsu who was great in the African Cup, but has barely seen the pitch at Goodison, so why loan him in in the first place?

McGeady hasn't worked, and Barry has faded since signing full time but seems to be a shoe-in for the first team.

Back to the point and no matter how fit RM says he is, Kone just isn't first team material, and never will be.

If QPR go down then Charlie Austen would be one I would go for to assist Lukaku.

RM has his favourites and may feel loyal to his own purchases and the current squad but quite honestly he would be wrong not to have a fire sale come the end of the season.

Everton are carrying too much dead wood.

These remaining games should be used to start the likes of Besic, Atsu, Oviedo, Browning and Garbutt.

"He is a player who is very important in terms of what the team needs on the football pitch."

That sentence alone should be a sackable offence. What the hell is he talking about. Every utterance that passes his lips is cryptically twisted and altogether meaningless.

Perhaps Roberto is hoping he eventually has the same effect on the fans?

It could be the second coming, were just not recognising it...

Perhaps someone should give him a crash course in Scouse and see how that works out. But seriously the man has lived and worked in Britain for long enough to have some understanding of how the general population think and speak - I do wonder whether he deliberately talks in riddles for his own amusement and when he gets back to FF has a good laugh with the players and staff as to how he has bemused the Journo's.

This is why rotation to facilitate the Europa League doesn't work. Europa League teams don't have players who are good enough to hit top form quickly. They cost too much.

Koné is Scottish Premier League standard – just like Naismith.

As for Kone, I know he is trying his best, and hopefully, he will get match fit and start scoring some goals, but I wasn't impressed with him at Wigan, when he was fit. He doesn't look suited to the lone role up top, and will the boss play two up front at Swansea?

I can't see it happening.

Having seen him a few times this year, I have to wonder if it's the same feller...

His recent performances basically look like this to me:

YouTube

How many shots on target do you think our midfield players have had this season? I wouldn't mind betting it's the least in the Premier League, and I bet it's Osman that has had most, even if he has been out most of the season. Christ, what I would do to see a Silva, a Coutinho, a Cazorla. Christ, I might even start watching games again!

Personally I would put anyone up front before Kone.

I quote: "Darren Gibson is NOT injury prone, just unlucky" ... Nurse... where's my medication?

Get rid.

Come to think of it, their styles are somewhat similar. All their geese are swans!

This post is becoming a prelude to a pantomime. Funny as some comments are, I worry about the long-term future.

Surely to god the board know what we know... but, then again, ego is the death of many a great fool.

Martinez Out!

Whatever money we have to spend, should we let him have it? No bloody way. Go, Martinez, go.

His "best" days, assuming he ever had any, are far behind him. As has already been pointed out 30 goals scored in 8 years. Speaks for itself. He's just collecting wages. I can't blame him for that. If I was in his boots, so would I. But, from the club's perspective, he's simply a drain on our financial resources.

I'm sure there's a Championship, or lower, club – Wigan comes to mind – crying out for an over-the-hill striker who hardly ever scores. Let him go and be a drain on their wage bill instead of ours.

Everton supporters always applaud a trier. We applaud players with limited skill; as long as they run about, we applaud them. We have had far too many talentless triers. I now want to see Martinez bring in some skill. A centre-forward who can hold up the ball and bring other players into the game. A centre-forward who can head the ball. A centre-forward who can put it up to defenders. A centre-forward who can score goals. Kone is not that centre-forward. And neither is Lukaku... yet.

I want to hear that Martinez is scouting for a world class forward to come to Everton. Not a load of nonsense about how great Kone is doing. There was a time when I was prepared to give Kone a chance, but we cannot wait forever. Time now to get rid. And the rest of the deadwood and walking wounded can go as well. Although I would not hold my breath on any of that happening.

I really hope that I am wrong, but next season could be every bit as terrible as this season. Someone joked that Martinez thinks that Cleverly could be the next Alan Ball. More like the next Bobby Ball, IMO. And that Alcaraz is the next Labone. Please don't joke about these things, cause I believe that that is how Martinez really does think. I believe that nothing much will change, between now and the start of next season. We will be going into next season with Howard, Alcaraz, Barry, McGeady, Kone, Atsu, Pienaar and Lennon, and possibly Cleverly. Not to mention an older Osman and Hibbert, and an injury-prone Gibson. God help us. Scary times ahead.

Why did Martinez offload Jelavic in favour of Kone? I will never understand the reasoning of this clown. Never.

Because of the current hate on for Martinez – no matter what the performance or result, it seems – suddenly having an inadequate, seldom-used reserve striker assumes immense importance. I suspect even if we win on Saturday, it will not be enough to silence the critics even for an hour or so. Indeed, I suspect one or two of you are ambivalent about whether we win or lose.

The MEN, Daily Mirror and Echo all have the same set-up with regards their club websites, I know the Echo and the Mirror are part of the same group but is the Manchester Evening News under their umbrella too?

£6 million didn't make much business sense because there would obviously be no resale value on him, but I think everyone forgets Kone was a really good player at Wigan. He scored 13 PL goals in the season Wigan were relegated, he could play upfront on his own or just behind the striker, and he often give defenders a torrid time.

I remember him being a real nightmare against us – he ran our defence ragged and Heitinga in particular could not handle him.

At the moment, I just think we are seeing a very rusty player who has just come back into the team after an 18-month injury lay-off. We will probably never see the Kone we saw from his Wigan days, as he's 31 now and will have lost a bit of pace and sharpness. Kone has turned out to be a very bad signing but that isn't necessarily Matinez's fault because he couldn't have predicted that Kone would get injured.

Come seasons end or early next year he'll be out on his ear if performances don't improve but meanwhile it's the party line and supporting him from management and that, to me, is fair enough.

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He was eventually hauled off after 76 minutes, far too late for any substitute to make any impact. Kone's ball control was abysmal and he wasted lots of balls sent to him and spent too much energy chasing aimlessly about, like Naismith who replaced him. The only worse performance we've seen lately from a Martinez man has been Alcaraz.