Unpacking the Managerial Options

The tried and tested appointments of foreign managers have not worked out for us and I would like to see a consortium of past players lead by Duncan Ferguson. At least then we will have people in charge and in the back room, who know what Everton are about and can transcend that message to our players.

“We are working like crazy to get this appointment right” – Text from Moshiri to his mucker, JIm White.

A return to the good old back channels of communication, eh, Davie P?? You'd better stamp down on that nonsense, laddo?

"Crazy" is a good description of the way things work here though.

One of our main problems recruitment-wise has been buying players with low footballing IQ, a lack of motivation, and questionable motives even signing for Everton.

This comes from a leadership without a rudder. Nobody knows what the plan is, so they buy whoever is available/willing to join Everton and so the merry-go-round continues.

With regards Duncan Ferguson you could also say he has been the assistant manager/coach of numerous failed regimes. He always seems to walk away from the bombed out, rubble strewn war zone without a spec of dust on his suit.

That’s said I’m still arriving at the same conclusion as you from the list presented. ‘If there’s no perfect answer keep Duncan until the summer ‘

Above all make a decision! and then buy two midfielders who are quality and tenacious fighters so Doucoure can have license to get forward. Seven days left to do this.

If we fail on this the manger issue will not matter a jot, because our central midfield is just not strong enough. At the moment we are an injury to Doucoure or Allan away from a much more serious threat of relegation.

And guess what, Doucoure is injured.

I worry that Favre would end up being like Ranieri this season, while I feel Vitor will end up having dressing room issues like Benitez. Rooney and Lampard would end up being like when Shearer took over Newcastle and took them down. It can only be Duncan for atleast 5 games more.

Diego Martinez, Niko Kovac, Paulo Fonseca, Rudi Garcia, Javi Gracia, Andre Villas Boas, even Gennaro Gattuso -- all would be better choices than anyone on your list in my opinion (although I do love the way Favre's teams play), and Martinez in particular did fine work in Spain and loves English football and the passionate Goodison crowd.

We do have options. Moshiri simply needs to investigate them.

When I saw the title I was expecting a list of managers we have not been associated with yet.

May I add Ten Hag, Christophe Gaultier and Steve Cooper to your list and say that the process should have been to seek counsel from some of "English" footballs wise men and headhunt the top options not talk to Jim White and Kia Joorabchian. We should also include Tiim Cahill in this search.

Also after pushing for Martinez to return Bill should not be part of the process as he is part of the problem with his clique throughout the club.

One upside - hopefully at least one of our shortlist will go there - from the names mentioned, most if not all of them can go - I wonder if anyone at Finch Farm fancies south - a few there to get rid of too

The chosen one must fit the circumstance and those doing the choosing must be tuned to exactly what those circumstances are. A huge problem given "ignorance is bliss" seems to be the mantra affecting all at this club.

Klopp is undoubtedly a good manager but fits the neighbours like a glove because of his emotive bravado. At Spurs or Arsenal for example I reckon they'd have him down as a bit of a tool. Also title winner Ranieri and CL winner Benitez both binned and Carlo ran from here like a scalded cat.

I don't know who the man is and as said on other posts we are in the hands of the gods but one thing is certain this comment " His first season (Martinez) was absolutely built on the back of Moyes’s hard-nosed culture." was a right load of bollocks.

Such is the shambles that is Everton: no idea;no structure, no organisation and;possible agent interference that I agree with you there are no good options once you go through the analysis. But Moshiri working like crazy, according to Jimmy White with the yellow tie( thanks for the reassuring update Michael), means that spin the bottle looks the best option and hope for a miracle.

I know, Crazy as it might seem, but that's the word that is being bandied about by the one that leads.

As I mentioned on another thread, I am endlessly bemused by TW's fascination with other clubs' current managers, whom we would have to pay tens of millions to buy out (even if they would be interested in us, which Galtier and Ten Hag most assuredly would not).

All the managers I listed are unemployed, so we would owe no compensation to other clubs. I think what little money we have available should be spent on buying players, not pirating managers who work for somebody else.

As for the other names, I’m just not sure these people are interested in Everton. I might be wrong but I’m assuming (hoping to hell) that’s the reason they’re not being talked about in the press or the bookies rather than Moshiri not looking into them.

I do think they merit consideration though, absolutely.

Jacques #24, you're probably right about Villas-Boas, but it's hard to imagine the others wouldn't at least take a call from Moshiri.

Martinez, who would be #1 on my list, has already visited Goodison on game day and was awed by the passion of the Blues. And he openly yearns to manage in England. If he does for us what he did for Granada, we are in the chips.

As for Kovac, reports today that he's still in the mix make me very happy. You're right, he pushed Frankfurt up the ladder, and he was splendid at Monaco with a 57% win rate. The fact that they just sacked him astonished me. Their foolishness might be our salvation.

Whoever is the new manager and whoever the manager decides to play, we need to get behind him. Give the players plenty of encouragement and support and don't get on their backs when they make mistakes.

I disagree with the article on 2 points though - one is your statement that 'there are no good (managerial) options' and that we have a 'group of mostly mediocre players'.

The managerial options that you listed in your article may not be good enough, but there are other options whose names have cropped up in relation to the Everton job. The one that I personally like the best (based on my Wikipedia trawl) is Niko Kovac.

My reasoning is simple - if a giant like Bayern Munich thought him good enough to manage their club, and if he has won the Cup and League double with Bayern Munich, and a career Goal Difference of +187 including a positive GD in all the clubs he has managed to far - that will do for me.

He has the right age profile (50) and good experience at the highest level as a player and manager for both club and country. His lack of experience in the Premier League is a concern, but he has played against English clubs in the Premier League, most notably a 7-2 shellacking of Tottenham Hotspurs managed by Pochettino.

Get him in, now if he is interested in the job. If not, let us all hold our nerves and give our backing to Big Dunc until the end of the season to get us out of this mess.

On the players, I believe we have about 6 players who are good (top 6) quality - Calvert-Lewin, Richarlison, Gray, Doucoure, Mina, Pickford. And some decent upcoming youngsters and squad fillers - Gordon, Patterson, Mykolenko, Townsend, El-Ghazi, Keane, Godfrey, Allan, Coleman, Davies, Gomes, Begovic, etc.

This bunch, if they are well managed and motivated, are well capable of taking us out of the mess right now. And, I do believe that we need a couple of mid-field signings to strengthen this area.

We have no faith in anyone at the club to at least try and do the right thing.

In our current situation any manager mentioned is viewed as fantastic and dreadful in the same thread.

We need to pick more of an Alardyce type manager than a Martinez.

Before Saturday I was confident that Ferguson could make us hard to beat. A draw would have been a positive start for him but the 4 man midfield, Kenny starting and the omission of Gordon has eroded a lot of faith I had in him. I just hope he doesn't repeat the same mistakes next week if he is still in charge.

We are in deep trouble with a group of players devoid of heart and desire.

Imo Pickford, Coleman, Godfrey, Allan, Doucoure, Gordon and Richarleson look like it hurts when we get beaten, they want to win. The rest either don't look interested, aren't up for the fight or just aren't good enough.

I honestly don't know who to appoint. I only know that he has to be a good defensive organiser. I don't care about style or philosophy. We need the points on the board nothing more.

The fav for the job Pereira is known as an attacking coach that doesn't pay much attention to the defensive side of the game! Oh dear.

Martinez is Swansea's, Wigan's and Belgium's greatest manager. He took them to unparalleled feats. All would want him back in a heartbeat. The fact he hasn't won leagues and more titles is testament to his journey. In the last four years all he could realistically win was the World Cup and they went agonisingly close. He has Belgium with a win record that many of the great Brazilian, German and Spanish sides would look favourably on.

At Swansea he is considered their best ever manager with statistically their record ever win percentage (roughly 10% better than Rodgers,Potter or Cooper), the creator of their philosophy and a league title to boot.
At Wigan likewise he is considered their best ever manager winning an FA Cup when you consider the squads he was up against and keeping them in the division all but one year all on a meagre budget. To win the FA Cup beating City is arguably the second best achievement of any manager in England for the last two decades after Leicester's title success.
At Belgium he has turned a decent squad with a couple of world class players into the number one team in the world and got to the semi's of the World Cup only beaten by the Champions. Again statistically he is their best ever manager.

When we sacked Martinez we were told he was a clown, a fraud and a charlatan, that our golden generation would improve for proper coaching but none have significantly improved and most seriously declined. All of his successors were given the tools to do the job yet he achieved more than all of his successors combined including the alleged greatest manager that ever lived. Fifth place with a record 72 point haul, last sixteen in Europe and two cup semi's is pretty impressive on a limited budget. Had it not been for a poor decision which changed the game against City in the Carling Cup I personally believe we would have won that competition. Likewise against United an error from Jags cost us when there was only one team look like winning it at that stage and we didn't even have time to respond. Statistically he is also one of our best managers despite many of our fan base perception of him as a failure. Getting to two cup semis in one season is such a feat that it took City until 2018-19 to do that given all their resources.

Personally I would love to see how the likes of Holgate,Gomes,Nkonkou,Richarlison and Godfrey would develop under him. He gets the best out of players and has improved them everywhere he has went. I also think giving Bobby Moshiri's weaponry would make a huge difference and as we seen from the signings of Barry and Mac he will identify the key problems in the squad that need addressed unlike the recent incumbents

Lampard has done nothing but mediocrity if even that and is only a contender based on name. He made the likes of Rudiger, Jorginho and Kante look shit, what we do with some of our players. He is still young and may prove a decent manager in time but his CV is not one to qualify him. Other names are arguably not qualified to be considered at this time except Perreira who is a mixed bag having great successes and terrible failures.

I personally think many Evertonians view have been greatly affected by the league form in that final season particularly from December onwards and the dreadful football and atmosphere at that time. I fully understand why many don't want him back. However from Jacques piece, based on a purely theoretical basis, Martinez is undoubtedly the completely outstanding candidate. Put it this way if Martinez had have managed an Italian or Spanish equivalent to Everton (and hadn't managed us) with similar results in addition to the rest of his CV he would arguably have been met on here with over 90% approval and would be seen as a great coup for the club.

Good piece on "Blue is the Colour...", by the way!

"Statistically he is also one of our best managers despite many of our fan base perception of him as a failure."

That depends which statistics you are looking at, Conor. In his final two seasons in charge, we won 30% of our league games. That's the worst 2-year stretch in the modern history of the club.

Yes, he had one fantastic season before that. Yes, the Cup runs were great. But a stretch of 23 wins over 76 league games is not a recommendation for rehiring the man.

And the simple fact is, this fan base watched him manage us for three years and does not want him back.

Mike for me that stat of yours is a bit flawed. In the second season we qualified for Europe with essentially the same squad. At that time English teams lost an average of nine points in the league table and most of them were serial Europa League performer with squads to boot.

If you look at how we performed that second season under Koeman where we went from seventh to a relegation fight, that is a more comparable season to compare. Had there been no Europe we would have finished eighth or above in all likelihood.

The third season we were actually doing really well in seventh until the wheels came off around December. I think Martinez and the Club channelled everything into winning a trophy for the club when finding themselves in no mans land which contributed to some of those dreadful, stale unmotivated performances in that second half campaign which ultimately cost him his job.

No one was more stale and unmotivated during that period than Roberto himself. It wasn't just the team's record that caused the fan uprising against him -- it was the near-universal perception that Martinez had checked out mentally, with no ideas or plans for what actions to take. And that just can't happen with a manager.

And I know you don't want to give weight to the fact that most of the fans don't want him, but it's crucial right now -- especially post-Benitez -- that we hire somebody the fan base will get behind. That is most assuredly not Roberto.

In terms of motivation, it happened to Pochettino at Spurs languishing in a dreadful fifteenth and Klopp at Dortmund when they unbelievably dropped to eighteenth at Christmas but they felt they couldn't sack him. You have put up Kovac who was Bayern's worst performer this decade and was the very embodiment of an unmotivated squad when sacked for languishing fourth. That season they went from 1.8 points (unbelievable for them) a game under Kovac to 2.67 under Flick.

Do you see him coming with no money to spend?

Don't want Rooney any where near the place. At least FSW had the balls to call us a small club. Rooney just thought it, went into hiding and scuttled off. If we were not good enough for him then, why would we be good enough for him now.

I'm not sure he'd be my preferred option (possibly that's Favre) but I think our emotional relationship to him has been soured, especially due to his last 4 or 5 months or so which included bad losses to Sunderland, Swansea, West Brom, Stoke, West Ham and more.

The players had lost faith. And so had the fans. I think it was probably right that he was sacked and remember being relieved at the time. But overall his tenure was a decent one. And he has certainly done impressive work elsewhere.

Out of the options discussed he is certainly one of the more accomplished managers. But would he be able to win the fans back onside? Maybe. I'd definitely take him over Lampard and probably over Pereira too.

Whatever the circumstances for our decline under Martinez following his first season, there was (and I’d wager still is) an almost universally held view amongst supporters that the football was dour and, in my opinion, so easily countered on account of him being so seemingly inflexible.

I do think you hit (inadvertently at least) on another point that worries me more about our current situation than the quality of our players, and that’s the quality of our support.

If I’m to give you the benefit of the doubt on your assessment of Martinez, then it was us who drove him out with our unrealistic expectations. The toxicity in our club is, unfortunately, a major factor right now. Appointing Martinez would pour petrol over that fire.

Even Pereira who has won things in his career is being talked of as a catalyst of protest or worse. If we go down, whoever the manager is, many of our supporters are going to have to bear their share of responsibility.

Like many Everton fans it breaks my heart that we have ended up in this awful situation.

My gut feeling is we go for Rooney. I just don't think we have the time to "bed" in any other manager who has no real blood connections with the club.

Based on current form this club is about to be relegated from the Premier League!

We need an instant response from the players and that message and direction needs to come from someone with a special connection with the club.

Rooney as an interim Manager until the end of the season can pull this off. Anyone else will get us relegated.

I was confused that you criticised Rooney for a lack of "moral leadership" but recommended Ferguson as the best of a bad lot. Surely one part of the Big Dunc effect is what you describe as the Neanderthal behaviour at Goodison. Anyone would be mad to take that toxic crowd on willingly - the banners and bottles are certainly doing their job.

As you say there are no good options. The idea of keeping Ferguson in situ till the end of the season is probably the highest risk of all as it will certainly bring relegation into play. Maybe this boil cannot be lanced without relegation?

My own view is that we would be lucky to get Lampard. He was treated badly at Chelsea and set the foundations for Tuchel. He is bright enough and ambitious enough, he knows the EPL inside out and has a point to prove big time after CFC. He would, however be mad to take on the EFC role. He has no chance - unless and until that toxic bench of sentimental dinosaurs is shown the door. If he does that as his first act - he has a chance. If not, he too is doomed.