Marco Silva and Injuries

Other clubs have injuries too but have good strength in depth to carry them over. Those clubs usually finish in the top six. We shall see if Silva's Everton have what it takes to get back there.

Gomes, Bernard and Mina all arrived at the club injured. So how can that be as a result of Silva's training methods? Zouma was not match fit.

McCarthy broke his leg months before Silva arrived at the Club. Seamus has broken his foot whilst on international duty in what is the first of setbacks following such a horrendous leg break last year.

Walcott has had a career of being injury prone, having appeared in over 30 Premier League games a season just twice in his career.

Calvert-Lewin has an ankle (bone, ligament, or tendon, not muscle) injury picked up whilst on international duty.

Michael Keane fractured his skull defending our goal against Bournemouth.

I'm struggling to see where Silva is at fault. Unless his training methods devise strategies in which players are able to put themselves at the most risk when going in for a challenge.

Link

It looks like Gueye, Coleman, Keane, Jagielka & Gomes are definitely out.

I think Mina, Walcott, & Calvert-Lewin should be okay to play off the bench (I'm speculating here).

Bernard has been taken off the injured list on the official site – so I assume he's fit.

I would go with:

Pickford
Kenny Holgate Zouma Baines(c)
Davies Schneiderlin
Bernard Sigurdsson Lookman
Tosun

Subs: Stekelenburg, Mina, Digne, Dowell, Walcott, Calvert-Lewin, Niasse

Baines to start for his experience – Digne unlucky to miss out.

However, that's a problem for the spring, not now. When players run out of juice and are playing on empty, they are a little more at risk of injury in a game. They're less able to hurdle a challenge they normally would for example.

But let's look at it in context, how bad has the injury situation been at Liverpool and Spurs who operate a similar high intensity training? Do we want to play high intensity pressing? The consensus here seems to be that we do, well this is the way we need to train. It's also why we need two players for every position, and not an 18-man squad like Moyes had.

I didn't "have a go" at Silva I just drew attention to the statistics which I qualified by saying "Now, obviously, there are many factors that can cause injuries, including bad luck. So I am not stating for a fact that Silva is responsible for these injury records." But since you have decided to deride my article I have some further clarification for you.

Firstly, Bernard wasn't injured when he arrived at the club. He came on as a sub in a game THEN he was injured some time prior to the next game. Lookman played at the start of pre-season and somehow got injured, as did Jags, Schneid, Gueye, etc. Not sure why Zouma wouldn't have been "match fit" on arrival given that Chelsea also train their players. Mina I have no clue when or where he got injured as it was a bit of a mystery why he was so late arriving at Goodison after deadline day.

Thirdly, you say "Calvert-Lewin has an ankle (bone, ligament, or tendon, not muscle)". Well ligaments and tendons and soft fibrous material that connects a muscle to a bone so are damaged like muscle due to overuse, wear and tear. Also, yeah Calvert-Lewin and Coleman got injured while on international duty, but again injuries are more likely when the body is already stressed.

Yes, Keane and McCarthy can't be held against Silva in any way shape or form but that is par for the course. Hence, why every team has a few injuries but it is the other 8 or 9 that caught my attention. I looked at past statistics and saw a trend. Does it prove anything? No. But I just think it is curious and will keep an eye to see how things play out long term. Rather like the zonal marking, I have no desire to see it end badly, but I am anxious about it.

There were no grumbles about injuries at Estoril or Sporting. I have no idea about Olympiacos, but I would point out Esteban Cambiasso (who was 35-36 years old) and he only played in 14 of the 30 league games, but 4 of the 6 Champions League games. He was being used sparingly in the big ones, and he did pick up two hamstring injuries, the first time he'd ever had such problems.

I did mention Hull. Also, as far as going back further, I did try to find out info on his prior but couldn't find any relevant stats that related to his injury record at all. In the post above I did say (assuming he had no issues in Greece/Portugal) that maybe it is an issue with the EPL versus Greece/Portugal where the games are not as physically demanding. In other words, you train really hard in Greece, then play moderately intense games and you're OK. You train really hard in England, then play really intense games and you're more likely to pick up some tweaks and knocks.

As I said, this is something that will be a problem after 20 games or so, when the players are knackered. We're 4 games in, it's far too early for the players to be knackered.

Any injuries now are purely down to bad luck. That is, injuries like Calvert-Lewin, Coleman, and Keane picked up. McCarthy, Gomes, Mina, and Baningime are all injuries that are nothing to do with Silva. Bernard is likely to just be an issue due to having hardly played a game in 2018 (was it less than 10 games this year?) and Walcott is always injured.

I believe Calvert-Lewin and Gueye will be in the squad and could start. I wouldn't read too much into this at all. Have a look next spring, that's when you can assess the effect of high intensity training.

You may be curious. But you are also being extremely negative.

I know you've got all scientific regarding muscle, tendons, ligaments etc – therefore you must be scientifically minded enough to know that 1 month into a season is not a fair enough sample period to assess whether Silva is responsible for player injuries as a result of his training methods.

Why are we judging him on anything just yet? Just give the man some time and let's see what type of side he can produce for us.

Doesn't it just point out that maybe Martinez's, Koeman's and Allardyce's training intensity wasn't up to scratch?

And trend in sport should be treated with a circumspect view. Not just dismissed. Your view is to look again in spring?! There could be nothing in it at all but, like the execution of zonal marking, it needs to be monitored... then either dismissed or amended.

Short term, small targets, and review with adjustments, yield better results than letting a longer-term view play out.

For a fastidious poster often interested in detail, that seems a contrary view to have?

Are you just dismissing it because of your utter faith in Silva? I hope not! 😊

I wonder if the other teams in the list include long-term injured? A better guide would be to divide the figures into those injured in training, and those in matches. Then you have to consider the type of injuries... strains, tears and pulls, as opposed to knocks from teammates or opponents.

Only then could we amend training methods if, for example, we were tackling too hard in training, or a link was made in the strains due to over-stretching or some other warm-up or warm-down training routine.

So... more info needed.

As for "wait for spring", it's far too early to see the effect of training upon these lads. It's the end of the season, the final few months, where high intensity teams tend to have injury issues and the teams run out of steam.

That's a criticism of Bielsa, of Pochettino, and of Klopp in the past. Any injuries now cannot be due to a change in intensity. These are elite level athletes. The problems will only be evident far into the season, not after 4 games!!

- Theo Walcott (rib), Idrissa Gana Gueye (knee), Bernard and Dominic Calvert-Lewin are all fit and available.

- Seamus Coleman (foot) is out but is expected to return in one to two weeks.

- Yerry Mina (foot) and James McCarthy (broken leg) have returned to training, with summer signing Mina now building up fitness with a view to being available for selection in the next few weeks.

We seem fragile both physically and mentally. We seem prone to injury, and prone to clutching a draw or a defeat from the jaws of victory. We seem prone to doing daft things that lead to soft goals and unnecessary red cards.

Now, maybe every supporter of every 'mid-table' club, or even every club who never wins trophies, feels the same. If this is the case, and we're always looking for explanations for the repeated disappointments we suffer, then all we can do is hope that things will change under the new regime founded on the 'new money' from Moshiri.

For example, if we have more and better players, sufficient in quality and numbers to cover adequately for injuries, then perhaps results will improve and we'll no longer have the compulsion to seek explanations for disappointments.