Martinez tips Mirallas to regain his momentum

I aired most of my views on Mirallas in Lyndon's article so I won't repeat myself but I will say Mirallas has more talent than all of our other wingers combined so we have to get him on the pitch and back to his best.

The left winger spot is fast becoming a joke. Countless times Galloway gets on the ball and no-one is in front of him. Cue about 10 seconds later, Naismith will trot out from a central position. So shambolic it's borderline farce.

He's just the player we need when we play the 'lesser' teams to help open up defences (never mind giving the fans a bit more excitement).

Hopefully RM feels Mirallas is mentally 100%...

Barry, McCarthy, Lennon, Pienaar, Gibson, Besic. All of these players combined will not score half the goals Mirallas will in a season. Midfielders and wide players must be contributing to the goals scored column in any successful side.

As Les said, get Mirallas, Deulofeu as our first-choice wide men, especially in home games! Barkley in better goalscoring form and we suddenly have a greater goal threat!

However I'm expecting RM to put another defensive mid in, maybe Besic or Gibson or even Cleverley to try to snuff out Arsenal, but IMO their weakness is still at the back certainly not going forward.

Team (4-3-3):
Howard,
Coleman, Stones, Jagielka, Galloway
Barry, McCarthy, Besic/Gibson
Lennon, Barkley, Kone
Lukaku

Lots of work ethic in there.

I think its been quite apparent the whole time he's been with us that KM has serious ups and downs with his attitude.

Ever since that penalty miss, he hasn't been right.

I expect us to come under the cosh on Saturday so we will need to optimize our counter attacking potential.

Perhaps he sees the game as a psychological exercise rather than an athletic sport. As reflected in his outpourings, he is unfathomable.

I loved the game best when the game and not the talk was all about 'flying wingers'. Before the psycho babblers like he and the Chelsea bloke took hold of it.

I know they have a strong squad but in the last few games he was not even on the bench. Maybe this is not just an Everton or RM issue?

Or maybe it's just something really simple like he hasn't been selected because he hasn't been featuring for his club side?

Some of you will jump all over this comment but the fact remains Mirallas was the scapegoat during Martinez's first season, often being brought off or left out of the side.

Second season was worse, his treatment was appalling, yet he still bagged goals and assists and was loyal enough to sign a deal, no matter what else was written about him. He even put up with playing second fiddle at times to McGeady, Yes McGeady!!!!

Third season under Martinez and we still don't see enough of Super Kev. Mirallas is a quality player who is also a dead ball man (something were missing with Baines out). He offers a genuine goal threat and is head and shoulders above all our wide men, including Deulofeu.

I feel his treatment from Martinez is awful and Kev looks like he's constantly having to prove himself. For me, he should be nailed on and one of our main men we need to get the ball to as often as possible. Martinez is the problem, not Mirallas.

Well, his classy gold car could quite easily be mistaken for something out of The Hitchikers Guide To The Galaxy I suppose. Then again, I don't think Kev could ever be traumatised by a spot of interplanetary kidnapping, no matter what sort of anal probe atrocities were perpetrated upon him by a bunch of bored alien bastards with nothing better to do.

He could be stripped naked, dunked in a sensory deprivation tank, have skin samples taken, blood and semen extracted, be mercilessly mocked in Martian for choosing mousse over gel, have his eyes clamped open and made to watch reruns of his stolen spotkick miss from last season on an endless loop, before being forced to record a full album with that retarded blue elephant that played the fucking keyboard in Return Of The Jedi in order to earn his freedom. Doesn't matter. I'm pretty confident that, whatever the reality, the modest Mirallas mind will act as a sort of self-defence mechanism and make sure the man himself remembers it all going down something like this:

Link

I don't know about being a scapegoat. As for the rest of that statement, you can go back further than Martinez's first season to Mirallas's first season (under Moyes) and the same thing applies.

It's taken a bit of time to sort these three problems out and I'm about ready to trust him over some of his team mates who don't get injured, don't think they're much better than they actually are, and are going to pull in the same direction as everyone else instead of acting like they're the next Marco van Basten when frankly, they just aren't."

That's what I read anyway.....

Why would Martinez need a scapegoat during his first season? It was a fantastic effort.

Martinez has the same problems with Mirallas that Mourinho is currently having with Hazard. If he is contributing goals and assists then you can forgive the defensive frailties. If not, then they both become liabilities.

The manager has to be sure that these types of players are physically and mentally prepared in order to risk them. They need to be consistent. Hazard has been, Mirallas has never been.

A fit and firing Mirallas would get into almost any Premier League team. He could give us a real cutting edge on the left, but he needs to get himself right and show desire and consistency.

I don't believe for a second that Martinez is keeping him out of the team for any other reason than fitness, form and mental fragility.

When he wants to really play, he is as good as anyone (West Ham, in the cup was the best individual performance I saw last season) but he doesn't do it enough. Probably because he thinks he's better than he really is.

Is Mirallas not better than what we have? Is Mirallas not capable of goals? Has Mirallas been given a constistent run in one position in Martinez's Everton side ever? (By 'run' I mean maybe 10 consecutive games) Was he not the fall guy for Del Boy in Deulofeu's first season?

Let's be honest, Mirallas could be instrumental to our team if someone put their arm around him a little bit and played to his ego. You may think professionals don't deserve that, but fact is some do and bigger clubs than ours are willing to do it.

Mirallas is a quality player, he tackles back as much as most wingers, he's a defender's nightmare on his day, and he's good enough to play for a lot of good sides. Blame who and what you like; I blame the manager.

Deulofeu twice.
McGeady.
Lennon twice.
Atsu.
As well as that, he's tried Naismith, Cleverley, Kone, Barkley and even McCarthy out there too.

Why not just stick with Mirallas for a short while?

Whilst trying all of the above, Martinez has failed to address the simple fact we do not own a left-sided player. Can anyone explain this to me please?

If I was Kev or Del, I would be very annoyed – one signs a new deal (I assume based on the promise of actually playing) and one is the manager's signing & neither can get a game. In the meantime, he plays people like Naismith out of position there instead.

Look at Tim Howard, he can perform awfully all season, get injured, be replaced by a younger lad who keeps 3 clean sheets in a row, and still walk straight back into the team. That's the type of blind loyalty shown to some players within our squad, and I feel like it's often shown to the wrong players.

Mirallas could do with growing a pair but if he felt like he was a important player for us he may step up to the challenge and play through small injuries but, if he's going to be paid anyway to either sit on a bench or sit in the crowd, the pull isn't the same as what it would be if he were going to start the match.

I don't get the insight to the players a manager gets and Mirallas does come across as a bit of a prima donna but I have one person I know who works with Everton and he tells me Mirallas is always staying behind working on set pieces. He tells me he's not someone who's out on the ale and he tells me he wants to be at Everton.

On what I've seen from Mirallas on set pieces, and the fact he's signed a new deal, I have no reason to doubt that my source is telling the truth!

Show him some love, RM, and see him blossom again.

Just what the hell is wrong with Roberto? He has got assets like Mirallas and Deulofeu watching from the wings when they should be out on the pitch at least showing what they can do.

If I'm honest, I never recovered any faith in Martinez when he reinstated the clown Howard after Robles did extremely well last season. He grabbed his chance, as they say, and Roberto simply stuck two fingers up to everyone (except Tim). Well there you go. That will do it.

I would love us to give a good performance and get a result against Arsenal, but with the same old stuff being churned up I just can't see it happening. Shit.

Sorry for pissing on your bonfire mate, but it's really difficult to see it any other way.

Now, when I hear the boss waxing lyrical about every fuckwit that is in the squad, and one of our better new-comers saying we will win at Arsenal, I remind myself of why our manager got up my nose last season. He talks players up and then doesn't play them. His interpretation of games like the derby or the pathetic Man Utd game also makes me wonder why I was so daft to have any hope at all.

The Arse will surely give us a lesson similar to the one in Singapore. We could, of course, surprise everyone with a smash and grab raid like at Southampton, but unfortunately, this Arsenal team are far better than Saints, and Roberto will not go for the win. We will play with our usual set-up, trying to stay in the game, and hope to catch them on the break.

Unless we get really lucky, we will fall behind on the half hour, come out unchanged for the second half, and see Kev or Del with 20 mins left, but not both. We will lose 3-1, and our goal will come when the game is over, and they take their foot off our throat.

I hope I am wrong, but I have seen us screw-up at Arsenal far too many times to kid myself that we will do any differently this time. Enjoy the rugby instead.