Everton's search for the winning formula goes on

Our one-touch football on the break is as good as anything being served up in the Premier League at the moment, However, we are completely reliant on 2/3 players being at the top of their game. The tactics are set in stone.

By playing two defensive midfield players every game, Martinez ensures that the primary function of 7 of our team is to stop the opposition. To be fair, it works most of the time; we look a solid unit and rarely give much away in open play.

The problems start when we give free kicks or corners away, we are a complete shambles. We can blame the players if we want, but to ignore the manager's record is to not recognise the problem, no matter who plays for him they concede from dead ball situations, A defence needs to be drilled, they need practice, they need to know their jobs . . There are no short cuts. Our entire team is riddled with doubt and uncertainty every time we face a set piece.

This is not (as some will try to twist it) a call to solely concentrate solely on set pieces in training, it's a call to plug the biggest and most obvious hole in the Premier League. Every time somebody mentions 'corner' and 'Martinez' in the same sentence, I get chest pains

In fairness to the previous games mentioned in your report, we came from behind against Palace and they are a top 6 club after 16 games of the season.

Martinez is blind to the fact that all good teams are built on solid defence. It doesn't have to stop you going forward but you have to get the basics right defensively. Every time the opposition get the ball in from crosses and corners you can see the panic it creates. Tim Howard is adding nothing; he doesn't organise, he doesn't punch or catch very often. Star jumps and the occasional shot stopped doesn't inspire confidence. We need a top defensive coach and a new goalie.

All-in-all, I think we'll finish top ten at best. I can't see that defence keeping Citeh at bay over two legs in the League Cup semis and I think even Dagenham will fancy their chances from set-pieces against that defence!

It's a crying shame, as this is the best crop of outfield players we have had in many a year and better management would make all the difference in turning them into trophy winners.

But yesterday, we should have been out of sight by half-time. Our front players have got to stop playing as though there'll be another chance along in a minute, so it doesn't matter if they miss. Even Lukaku, who has been excellent in recent weeks, missed a sitter or two yesterday. We're making chances by the hatful but only taking a small percentage of them.

Letting one goal in away from home shouldn't automatically mean you don't win the game. So frustrating!

Some believe that we are a whisker away from it all clicking into gear,and then we're going to be just like Howard's army of the 80s. Not a chance.

Martinez talks shite and does not address the issues that most on TW see, week-in & week out. He has a job for as long as he wants it under this Board of Directors. We have seen The RS sack their manager, Swansea do the same.

I will be amazed if we have a good Christmas run in. As the co-commentator said, if Everton draw this game, they're going to feel terrible after their first-half performance. He of course being a ex-RedShite player was gloating, as he had very little to say during the first half. Oh the irony; they just love it when we shoot ourselves in the foot, week-in & week-out.

I have no answer but neither does Bobby boy.

My views will be at odds with the majority of TW followers but that's why football is such a special game.

I would play a 4-3-1-2 system:

Robles;
Coleman, Stones, Jagielka (once fit), Barnes;
McCarthy, Barry, Cleverley;
Barkley;
Lukaku, Deulofeu.

Howard simply isn't good enough these days. The back four picks itself.

I would encourage the fullbacks to provide width with Deulofeu switching wings during the game and one of the fullbacks providing the width on the other side of the pitch. This would allow the fullbacks to be more dynamic in attack.

One of the problems we've had this season is being overrun in midfield in the second half of games as the likes of Deulofeu, Barkley and Kone, none of whom find defending a natural part of their game, tire and lose concentration, giving the initiative to the opposition.

Barry would be a holding player patrolling in front of the back four, providing cover for the fullbacks and Stones when he makes a break. Cleverley and McCarthy would be the legs, the energy, breaking up attacks and supporting Barkley whose job would be to provide the ammunition for Lukaku and Deulofeu. I wouldn't expect Deulofeu to track back but be ready for the counter attack.

Once we've mastered the art of holding on to a lead, then a more flexible approach could be utilised.

Cover for Lukaku must be a priority in the January window and a genuine creative midfielder. I hate the use of a No 10, with goal scoring ability, would be a useful addition.

I would also encourage the use of some of the Under-21s in the later stages of matches as substitutes rather than Osman, Gibson or Naismith.

In my opinion, one of my biggest gripes with us is that – despite insisting on playing with two defensive midfielders every week – we are still piss poor at closing the opposition down.

Consistently, when we lose the ball when we're on the attack, it only takes a couple of passes and they're in a threatening position. We might now be attacking and passing the ball reminiscent of Barcelona – the difference is, we can't get it back like they do!

Why doesn't Rom come up for corners and stick Kone up front? I think a defensive coach is essential now but sadly we know how blinkered and stubborn Martinez is... so nothing will change.

I don't care about the history which Mirallas may have accrued with Martinez, he's one of our best players and should link very well with Lukaku. I keep reminding myself that he had a 1-in-2 record with Olympiakos and he can also pick a pass. We're wasting him and Martinez needs to manage any personal issues, that's what he's paid to do.

I'd stick for now with Cleverley on the left instead of Kone, who should be used as a sub – that's where he should be, given his age and fitness. I accept that we probably won't get a Number 10 or left-sided player in January (especially a Number 10) but, if we could get a Yarmolenko, I think it could transform us.

The imbalance in the team is embarrassing. The other, admittedly speculative, option on that side would be to get Baines much fitter (how come he's so obviously out of condition?) and push him forward ahead of Galloway.

I agree with you about Robles – Howard is not as bad as some make out but he is part of the problem and Robles should be given a chance.

I would tell Barkley to up his game or he will be dropped. I'm a great fan of this immensely gifted player but it's like watching a Lamborghini that never gets out of third gear.

Besic is our other wildcard, in my opinion, but he seems to have been locked up somewhere at Finch Farm. It would be nice to see him again because I think he could be a big part of our future.

As for the captaincy, I would give it either to Coleman or McCarthy when he's fit and I would not give it back to Jagielka whom I admire but who is classic Everton "nice".

Finally, I think it's time to start talking about the manager again. I understand that we will be told that such talk is hysterical and that we should all stay calm and watch the side fulfil itself but I think he's had his chance and he's blown it.

This is an absolutely critical moment in the history of our club and we need to act decisively and ruthlessly. Problem is, who's in charge?

Martinez knows what he has got, a young side that is going places,and he will work it out. The chances will keep coming, our look will change and someone is going to get tonked!!

The defence is still so young yet learning all the time, so the mistakes will happen at the beginning, it is to be expected, but time will sort.

Chill out, grab a Chang and relax! It is going to be one hell of an exciting season for us, and we are only one third in as yet

He is much more mobile than I expected. I think next season he could form a formidable midfield with McCarthy and Besic.

Barry will still have a part to play over the next couple of seasons as part of the coaching staff as his playing experience and ability to read the game is second to none at the club.

For god's sake, Everton – buck up your ideas and we can still salvage something from this season.

I don't remember their goalie actually having much to do, but do remember at least 5 shots from us that didn't even bother him, not counting Baines's effort against the post.

Two saves from Kone in the first half and a good one from Barry near the end.

(Likewise a higher points tally may still see some sides being relegated compared to previous seasons – I can see 18th spot maybe having as much as 35 points, due to how competitive the league is this season.)

If Everton average two points a game from here on in, that will give us 67 points, and I think that'll be good enough for 4th place and a Champions League play-off place. It will almost certainly be enough for 5th place and the Europa league.

As Colin said, Everton just need to buck up their ideas, turn those draws into wins more often than not, and it certainly is on.

1. Leicester (35) Chelsea (39)
2. Arsenal (33) Man City (36)
3. Man City (32) Man Utd (31)
4. Man Utd (29) West Ham (28)

Last season, Arsenal sat in 5th place just 2 points behind 4th placed West Ham and ended up in the CL places.

The relegated teams had 13, 14 and 15 points after 16 matches whilst this season's likely pace-setters Leicester had only ten points. Aston Villa are in an even worse position than Leicester were but the teams from Bournemouth downwards are still in the mix for the dreaded drop. Last season, 3rd from bottom Hull City went down with 35 points; Aston Villa escaped with 38.

Everton and Liverpool both had 21 points at the same stage of the season, with the neighbours taking a EL place with 62 points.

This season may be one of those unpredictable ones in terms of match results but the pattern isn't that much different to last season. The minimum points tally for CL was 70 points last season and to earn a EL spot it was 60. I imagine it will be something similar this time around so for Everton to gain a place in the Europa League, they will need to accrue somewhere in the region of 37 points from the remaining 22 games, for CL somewhere in the region of 47 points. Everything is possible but I wouldn't hold my breath unless of course we start to keep a string of clean sheets and manage to win more than the odd game in isolation.

I'm with most of the above. We have a really exciting squad at the moment and its all going to go tits up because we can't defend set pieces, and "apparently" we don't practice scoring from them or defending them. If we don't, and I find it hard to believe we don't, I couldn't care less whether Roberto got the sack tomorrow. I think it's pretty ignorant to ignore how many goals can be scored from set pieces and how better organised you can be from practice. To ignore this stinks.

Anyway, I tend to agree with Les Martin. I think this team is exciting and if our manager and defence can sort their heads out, we can go pretty far. I'll focus more on the great first half at Norwich and not the shite second. I hope Roberto does the opposite.

When Ross started to play regularly for the first team Martinez explained that he was a raw and exciting talent who would make mistakes and therefore we should all be patient. I don't think anyone would disagree with that line.

Lately, however, Berkley looks increasingly like a player who doesn't want to take chances. He looks as though his primary focus during the game is on not giving away possession.

When a teammate passes the ball to Barkley it's almost certain he'll get it straight back. If his teammate then passes it back straight back to Barkley the the odds are he'll get it back again. You get the impression that this pinging of the ball to each other could go on all day if left to Barkley.

It's rarely Barkley who breaks out of this ineffective passing mode and yet he is the one player with the capability of turning and going off at speed in another direction and making the break which takes the opposition by surprise. It's not happened in recent games.

To me, it seems that Barkley has totally absorbed Martinez's 'possession at all cost' philosophy. Possession is king and if you have possession you, and not the opposition, are controlling the game.

Unfortunately as most of us know and continuously complain about this is only a part of the equation. With Martinez I always get the impression that his possession mantra overrides all the other important facets of the game. These include the two key elements such as defending as though your life depended on it and and at the the other end of the pitch trying win the game at all cost by taking every chance to shoot rather trying to create the perfect scoring opportunity.

Anyway back to Barkley. He is obviously a lad who at this stage of his career is massively under the influence of Martinez and I'm not sure that Martinez possession focus is getting the best out of the huge talent that Barkley has. The bottom line is Barkley under Martinez's influence is turning in to someone who is increasing fearful of taking chances.

The fact is Barkley has played better for England in in his last couple of games where he done just what he should be doing for us. We seem to be playing him deeper but this too is a waste of his talent. He's not the type of player, at least at the moment, who can spread the play with long range passes. He need to be attacking the penalty are and, dare I say it, shooting on site!

A top four finish this season is totally out of the question. Seriously, if we cannot beat teams like Crystal Palace, Norwich, Bournemouth, Watford, Swansea, Stoke then we are not going to be any better against the teams above us in my opinion.

The squad is young with decent experience in there also and we have the basis of something special, I believe, but we are simply too inconsistent over 90 minutes and at the end of the day that is down to coaching and the manager is it not?

The points we have dropped from our last 3 games alone would see us now in 4th position. It's not all down to luck. This season was our big chance; next season will be even more frustrating with key players moving on.

Rome wasn't built in a day, but we are getting better, much better actually, and it's probably the biggest reason, why so many posters, are so disappointed at the minute.

Cleverley, looks like he has improved the team offensively, but if Martinez, is saying he won't stand in either Naismith's or Mirallas's way, then I'm sure we will be bringing in a couple of players in January. Like everybody is saying, let's hope one of them is a true leader.

Rome wasn't built in a day,but we are getting better much better.

Well said mate

The so-called exciting stuff you talk about only gets played for 45 minutes; the game lasts 90... Oh and we've already tonked two sides, the woeful Aston Villa and Sunderland. I never got carried away after them, because I knew what was coming after.

The manager disregards set-pieces as some sort of irritant. An irritant, by the way, that's costing us big time, and while he's manager this will carry on.

I'll stick my neck out right now and say Everton will not finish in the top half of the table as we have an undroppable goalkeeper who won't move off his line and lack of a dominant centre-half and midfielders who consider it an annoyance to track back and help out the defence.

Martinez has stated that he won't be buying in the next window so it looks like we're stuck with what we've got so set-pieces will continue to yield goals. I'm actually wetting myself every time we concede a corner – that's how worrying it is.

And look who's in town on Saturday... high-flying Leicester City. As someone earlier said, it looks like we'll have to score 3 or 4 to beat them. The way we missed chance after chance against Norwich, I won't be holding my breath.

On Ross Barkley and his form, whilst I agree that he does look like he's playing in 2nd gear sometimes and is afraid of losing possession, this season he has 6 goals and 5 assists. Last season he got 2 of each. If that isn't Martinez improving a player, I don't know what is.

On defensive frailties it's harder to defend Martinez, and he has to certainly take some criticism, at the same time I think that John Stones needs to as well. He is not the finished article, and whilst he is awesome with the ball at his feet I think the we need to recognise he's not the league's best at defending corners or crosses into the box. I agree with those criticising Martinez if it is indeed the case that we are not actually working on this on the training ground.

On the Norwich game in particular, the person who deserves most of the blame in my opinion is Lukaku. He is one of our best players at the moment and whilst he's come on leaps and bounds from last season, a 㿊m striker should not be missing sitters like he did against Norwich. We should have been 3 up by half time. That one can't be blamed on Martinez.

On the keeper, this clearly is Martinez's biggest failing. We have in Robles, at least a capable understudy and potentially a better keeper. Certainly when he came in last season he kept clean sheets when Howard couldn't, and in the League Cup this season he has looked good. Howard is at the end of his career, Martinez needs to recognise this and go and get a keeper who can help us get top 4 if he doesn't believe that keeper is already on the books in the shape of Joel Robles.

He may have missed a couple of chances but he's currently second in the goals-scored table and has already beaten club records that stretch back to Latchford and Heath.

If the manager can't set us up to defend set pieces, then I don't see how that can possibly be the striker's fault.

The goalkeeper should come and take out everything in his path. Instead we get Howard flapping about on his line like a Penguin trying to fly.

Everything that follows is a direct result. Robes needs to play.

As a new coach, not knowing what else to do and therefore in desperation really, I immediately brought my 6'2" striker back at corners and left the 5'6" number 10 up on the half-way line. I also flooded the box with mid fielders as well as defenders.

The main key I think was to get my captain to be very vocal about who was responsible for picking up who, ie, our taller, better headers picking up their tall, good headers. The result was often chaotic defence as we pretty much had 10 players in or around the box but we shipped just one goal from corners all of last season.

We are only a 3rd Division team in a small, provincial town and I'm not suggesting the ability of our opposition remotely have the ability of a Premier League striker, but it sure as hell fixed the problem.

It takes a corner less than 1-1.5 seconds to get to the near side of the six-yard box if driven, slightly longer if floated. The keeper has to first recognize the angle and pace of the ball and anticipate where it is going to land. He next has to fight through the opposing players put in front of him. This is as he is then running out to fight through his own defenders and trying to get his arms clear of his own defenders' heads and shoulders to punch the ball while being jostled and knocked around and even to the ground.

Even if he does punch it, he is now 6 yards off his line. That assumes he can even get there before the ball at that point. This will succeed in allowing goals to be scored and the keeper to get hurt.

There are coaches who time the ball flight in order to help offensive players figure out the distance they can back up to get a good run and leap on the ball (offensive players know whether the ball will be driven and where it is supposed to go) but the same timeframe applies to the defense too.

Case in point: on the Norwich goal, Howard had one large Canary in front of him and 5 more players at the spot of the ball 6 yards out. You really want him to come out and miss everything? What would you say then? Instead, he stayed on his line like any GK, Robles included, should have done, based upon the initial read. Howard actually deflected the ball from the line right to Barkley who got the assist for the Norwich goal (but at least was trying to help).

No goalkeeper does what you want. Not Cech. Not Lloris. Not Courtois.
Keep looking for one because I suspect he will be right next to the leprechaun since both are make-believe.

I agree with most of your post. The keeper cannot and should not come for EVERY ball in his six-yard box.

However, what you fail to acknowledge is that Howard is easily the worst keeper in the league when it comes to dominating his area. The most frustrating thing is that the man himself has refused to address this issue throughout his entire career. He is unable to take criticism even when thoroughly deserved.

Martinez bangs on about having the 'right characters' at the club. Howard's baffling arrogance in his own ability and contempt for the fans should have been enough to see him out the door. Add to that the fact he has an understudy who has outperformed him at every opportunity... it really is a mystery as to how this man is still between the sticks.

THAT is Everton's problem and no amount of beating around the bush and deflecting will take it away.

First, I was only responding to the idiotic posts by some on here about what a keeper should do or not. Yes, one indicated he should come for every cross. Another indicated he should essentially bash his way through every player in front of him. Second, Howard comes for crosses close into his goal just like the Leicester game. He does not go out to the 6 and never has. That is not arrogance it is his style of play.

Arrogance is thinking you know better than him what he should do after the thousands of hours he has spent on positioning, groundwork, footwork, and yes punching and catching. Arrogance is thinking that he is wrong and you are right when you don't play the position for the club. No manager has criticized him for his style of play. Odd that over here his performances on the USA team are the same but we have defenders who can deal with it.

As for Robles, please stop stating opinion as fact. He is clearly not better. Check the stats over his career, or this season thus far. Second, as one poster noted about RM seeing Naismith train that, "if he isn't playing he isn't showing enough in practice," applies to Robles. His performance in the League Cup have been average or woeful. Remember his gaffes caused the extra time game or did you forget.

Howard, based upon the stats from 6 different websites I have reviewed is not near the bottom but instead is in the top half (as high as 3rd) of the goalkeepers in the league. Again, if you don't like the way he plays just say so but put your continued criticism down to your own arrogance about the position rather than his.