THRILLS? I WOULD RATHER HAVE NO FRILLS!
Dyche: We need to get back to being ‘boring’ to become a stable Premier League presence
AS the dust settles on Everton’s latest last-gasp escape from the clutches of relegation, Sean Dyche’s message becomes painfully clearer.
The manager who somehow steered the Goodison Titanic away from the iceberg of the Premier League drop, was a very different figure on Sunday night from the one who has demanded a tight ship over the past four months.
This was a coach speaking from the position of strength, with safety secured (after Abdoulaye Doucoure’s winner on Sunday, below) and the gratitude of an emotional fanbase still ringing around the club’s famous, but dilapidated old stadium.
He didn’t say it explicitly, but still, his meaning was brutally clear. Dyche wants club owner Farhad Moshiri to stop living on a fantasy island where Everton are challenging for European honours... and get real.
He also wants Moshiri to stop dreaming of a celebrity manager – or “fashionista” as he calls it – who will guarantee the glamour of a Pep Guardiola, and instead accept the reality of the Toffees’ grim situation.
Dyche’s words were admirably pointed, viciously cutting in fact. He knows he is not the most charismatic of figures, but he wants Moshiri to accept that “boring” is sometimes necessary.
“I’ve tried to be realistic since I’ve been here, but the problem with realism is not many people want it because it sounds boring. But at the end of the day it is time for that,” he explained.
“There was a time when this club went ‘Let’s just do everything’, but there is a time for realism, that’s what I’ve learned. We need to click it back together, realign it, and get the fans connected to what we are as a team, to what I am as a manager.
“And then there will be another day when a fashionista can come in and we’ll have a beautiful product, but what we need now is a rawness, a heartbeat that the Evertonians can grip to.”
Reading between the lines, Dyche’s meaning is clear. He has already heard the rumours that Moshiri isn’t excited by Everton – or their down-toearth manager – at present, and yearns for a celebrity boss.
He knows an owner who has veered from appointing Sam Allardyce and Rafa Benitez to wanting Marcelo Bielsa is capable of anything.
But he also knows that there is no money now, with the Premier League investigating the club for possible breaches of profit and sustainability rules, so Moshiri’s dreams of challenging Manchester City are total nonsense. And so for Dyche, the answer lies in building a clear structure, a clear identity, and a clear philosophy from the top down... starting with the owner.
“We have to demand more internally,” he said bluntly.
“There has been a reality check, we need solid thinking going forward. We are not ready to be up there yet, that is quite evident. It’s going to be building and progressing, and I need the Evertonians to understand that.
“I’m just tired of giving you nonsense. I’m trying to tell Evertonians the truth. You can mess about with all the myths about how we are going to play like Man City now we have got it over the line and it’s going to be wonderful – it’s not.
“It’s going to need loads of hard work to be done, and the spending won’t be the size it was – it is not going to happen. We must be wise, recruit wisely and recruit players who, if possible, understand this club.
“There is a massive amount of change to build a new dawn, a new future, a bigger future if you like. You are only a big club if you do big club things.”