International whinge
Will England’s sleeping giants Everton awaken this year?
There is a song that blares out at Goodison Park before every Everton home match to get the crowd going and it goes like this: “It’s a Grand Old Team to play for; it’s a Grand Old team to support; and if you know your history; it’s enough to make your heart go worrrrrrrrr, “We don’t care what the Red [expletive] say; what the [expletive] do we care?; because we always know; that there’s gonna be a show; when the Everton boys are there!” And if you do know your history, you’ll be aware that only Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal have won more than Everton’s nine league championships. In traditional terms, they are certainly a ‘bigger’ club than a Chelsea, Manchester City or Tottenham Hotspur, but have allowed those three to move past them as in the Premier League era, money talks and if you don’t have it, success is rare. Even when Blackburn Rovers won the Premier League title in 1995, it was off the back of the millions pumped into the club by then owner Jack Walker. Leicester City’s victory last year was freakish and cannot be used as any sort of barometer. Everton were founder members of the English League in 1888. Goodison Park, built in 1892, was the world’s first purpose-built football stadium. The Toffees have played more seasons in the English top-flight than any other club. Their list of ‘firsts’ and other records runs for pages. Liverpool only exists today because of Everton. Few know that Everton’s original ground was Anfield, but that they moved out over a dispute with landlord John Houlding over rent and went across Stanley Park to the site that is now Goodison Park. Houlding went on to form Liverpool Football Club shortly afterwards, adding to the bitter rivalry between the two clubs that was also fuelled for many years by the fact that they were both challenging for top honours. But to today’s generation, Everton are a team of mid-table mediocrity, with their last trophy the FA Cup in 1995 and their last league title coming in the 1986/87 season. However, there is genuine optimism within the club that things are about to change in the coming years after English-Iranian businessman Farhad Moshiri, previously a shareholder in Arsenal, bought a controlling stake in the club and has promised to spend generously on beefing up the team. There is also a chance the club will have a new stadium in the docklands area of Liverpool within the next five years, which would be a significant boost to their ability to compete commercially with other clubs. Moshiri has already splashed the cash, bringing in former Dutch international and Barcelona defender Ronald Koeman as manager to add discipline and tactical know-how to the squad, and early signs have been encouraging, despite the team still being frustratingly inconsistent. But Koeman knows there is no quick turnaround, and talks of his time at Everton as a ‘project’, something that will take three, four or five years to really bear fruit. Foremost for Koeman is to reinvigorate an aging squad, bring in a top-class goalkeeper, a commanding central defender and find the right attacking players to play around Romelu Lukaku. The emergence of England junior internationals Tom Davies, a hugely promising central midfielder in the Steven Gerrard/Frank Lampard mold, striker Dominic Calvert-Lewin and defender Mason Holgate bodes well. But the key to success is how Koeman works in the transfer market and now that the club has the money to compete with the uber rich, whether he can attract top talent. Everton poached Steve Walsh fr from champions Leicester City at the e end of last season and installed him a as their technical director, with the sp specific task of identifying and bringin ing in the right players for Koeman to w work with. Walsh, whose brother Mickey played for Everton in the 1970s, was the man who scouted Riyad Mahrez, Jamie Vardy and N’Golo Kanté for Leicester, and Didier Drogba for Chelsea. Koeman has been critical of the pace at which Walsh has worked, but ultimately knows patience is needed. Moshiri, Koeman, Walsh and a lot of cash could be the injection Everton need to take themselves back to the top in an era when money talks and history means little.