I’ve never heard such optimism from Everton fans since the days of Kendall and Lineker
YOU would have struggled to find many Evertonians in April who didn’t want the season declared null and void.
Not just because their neighbours were about to explode with joy and relief at winning their first league title in 30 years, but because Everton had little or nothing to play for.
During Project Restart they rarely rose above the turgid and, at the beginning of close-season when targets Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Gabriel went e lsewhere , there were fears Carlo Ancelotti would tire of trying to squeeze results from a substandard squad and walk away.
And then, almost overnight, the entire landscape appeared to change.
In came a new midfield of Allan, Abdoulaye Doucoure and James Rodriguez, for the cost of one-and-a-bit Gylfi Sigurdssons, and once Evertonians ceased rubbing their eyes and focussed them on the opening game, they glimpsed a rare sight.
A first away win against a topsix side in seven years, and a first opening-day triumph outside of Goodison since 2001.
But it wasn’t so much the victory, achieved with room to spare, that elevated Evertonians into a rare state of post-match ecstasy. It was the fact that, w ith Anc e lot t i bringing in the calibre of player he demands to work with, they were finally looking at a team in blue that offered an attitude and an identity.
An XI that had the makings of a proper, fearless Everton team, the like of which was last seen under Howa rd Kendall in the mid-1980s.
The talent and selfbelief of the three new additions, who had barely trained at Finch Farm, was lifting talents like Richarlison, Dominic CalvertLewin and Lucas Digne to a higher level. And with a third of a new team installed, even the bench seemed half decent.
It is a single game, of course, so caution is needed, but I’ve never heard so much genuine optimism coming from Evertonians since they went into the 1985- 6 season as champions, having beaten allcomers to sign Gary Lineker ( left, with Kendall and the footballer of the year trophy in 1986).
Like Lineker, they have a World Cup Golden Boot winner in Rodriguez, who promises to bring something that has been in very short supply at Goodison for decades – stardust.
And also, as his image in a royal blue shirt lit up New York’s Times Square and his 46million Instagram followers began to Google Everton, a realisation that the global commercial opportunities they have yet to tap into could become a possibility.
Bill Kenwright did his best for the club, but there was always a sense, even in the relatively good days under David Moyes, that any optimism would be checked by inevitable disappointment.
The mantra was they were punching above their financial weight and would continue to tread water until a sugar daddy could take them forward.
Farhad Moshiri has lived up to that billing, putting his hands in his deep pockets and selling his vision to some of the best talents in the world, like Ancelotti, who has only come to Everton to be a winner in the present, not a safe pair of hands asking for time to build a future.
It’s ridiculously early in the season, but there was a shift in perspective for Evertonians who watched that Spurs game.
They had a vision of how the years ahead could look if Moshiri and Ancelotti hang around and continue to improve the squad. It gave them hope that they may soon have a team they can believe in again, one that lives up to the quality of their traditions.
They say, for football fans, it’s the hope that kills you. But having felt hopeless for so long, Evertonians are more than happy to take that risk.