BFTG Everton

[Jano]

A couple of things, maybe a little bit of a reality check for the club and fans alike -

The crowd as others have said was piss poor. Shows to me exactly what people thought of the quality of football on offer the past few seasons that we couldn't fill out the stadium against top prem opposition in a cup, especially after getting so far in the FA Cup last season. We were all shocked it wasn't sold out.

Everton last night played a formation and set up straight out of the Brendan Rodgers book of tactics. As someone who has unfortunately had to watch a fair few Tottenham games over the years, if there was ever a player less suited to playing right back than Aaron Lennon I've yet to see one. We should have been attacking them all day long down that side yet I only think we did it once, and we scored. That we didn't target him (why weren't we sticking Blackman on him from any goal kick for Al-Habsi to aim for?) showed me that maybe Clarke wasn't too bothered about progressing. This was backed up by why Hurtado wasn't pulled off instantly after he should have been sent off, for Clarke to leave it ten minutes was absolute madness.

I'm also not getting the Tshibola love in. Yes he's good. Reminds me alot of Leigertwood. Will probably end up a top Champ/lower prem player but I can't see anymore than that. He's very good defensively but he slows down the play way too much going forward and when up against decent opposition he will just get passed around. Osman, Deulofeu and Barkley were doing it quite often last night. Deulofeu when he wasn't pretending to be superman and Barkley when he was pushed further forward were heads and shoulders above anyone else on the pitch for me (except for Cooper, as that's impossible).

Didn't see much of their goals as they were down the other end but I've always thought if the goalkeeper gets his hands to it, which Al-Habsi did on the second one, he's disappointed not to make the save, so that one has to go down as a clanger. The first one just looked like a powerful volley through a crowd of players. the team will probably be disappointed to have conceded on two set pieces.

That being said. We did cope extremely well with Lukaku who was disappointing. Taylor did very well but had very little help from Piazon who has about as much strength in a tackle as a dead fish and was left on his backside way too often, he was however good going forward and his little turn taking the ball past three Evertonians was lovely to see. Gunter had next to nothing to do all night but I also thought Hurtado protected alot, although it was pretty obvious Hurtado was struggling with the pace of the game. I liked what I saw though as far as work rate went and he linked up well with the other forwards, so that looks like a good signing for the future. Hernandez was the same really, started a little off the pace but came into the game as it went on, looks like a very good player and more than capable of filling in for Norwood should he be needed. I've also been speaking to some colleagues at work about Ola John as we have a warehouse in the Netherlands, firstly they were surprised we had him as he was seen as a very promising player for the future and they thought he's good enough for a top ten prem side. The main thing I got from them is that if we get him playing and get his confidence back, he would rip the champ a new one, which I saw glimpses of last night. Blackman took his goal well and is obviously playing with confidence, but is still too selfish for me. He needs to learn when to pass the ball as he just seems to run at the defence and shoot or lose the ball whenever he gets in sight of the goal.

[biff]

https://youtu.be/DjLlgUq1yXg

Highlights. The second looks worse and worse.

[Sanguine]

Jano, respecting your opinion and all that, but seriously, lighten up. We played very well.

[JC]

Being a relatively big club Everton have many supporters locally and especially London, so not a long trek.
As for us who might consider returning a midweek cup game is not that attractive, even for a tenner. Add in 2 home games so recently and it is fully understandable.

Far better to identify an unattractive home game, and do a one off cheap price, imho, and better than the batch ticket offer.

Frankly, even if Everton had 1000 in from Binfield, last night was fcking piss poor from us and impressive from the opposition.

I was so embarrassed by the give away price for my nephew that I paid £12.00 and got him an adult ticket (also meaning someone else could have used it had he not been able to make it)

We only got 16k 4 days after putting 5 past Ipswich

Unless you are someone who is struggling to put food on the table, the club should give up trying to tempt those for whom £12.00 is too much to watch us play Premiership opponents.

When we are promoted (and I'm seriously considering backing us heavily to make it for next season) you can all cry like babies for yet another 12 months/get lucky and see the odd match from a cr@p seat.

Too many so called fans in this town just do not deserve RFC as their home team.

I too was disappointed at the attendance against Derby but what I did notice was that all of the attendances for the midweek games that week were unusually low. Brighton and Leeds were the highest at just over 21,000, Birmingham had 16,600 and we were next with 15,600

I think there must have been a reason for such low crowds as we had more than Burnley, Cardiff, QPR and others

[JC]

https://youtu.be/DjLlgUq1yXg

Highlights. The second looks worse and worse.

It also makes the first look pretty poor too
It does also show how many chances we had to wrap it up in the first half

[Jano]

Jano, respecting your opinion and all that, but seriously, lighten up. We played very well.

I'm not saying we didn't, but we also haven't suddenly turned in to Barcelona either

[Fox Talbot]

Some good points from Jano above esp about Hurtado.

Frankly I think we lost because we didn't want to win it enough. 1-0 up with half an hour to go against a PL club playing like drains and with our really strong bench - we should have closed the game up with some first teamers coming on.

It's a national cup tie, not a training session put on to see how Hurtado, John and rest acclimatise to English football.

All the same we did play surprisingly well. But I'd rather we'd won.

[Vision]

Before we signed Al-Habsi my opinion of him was that he was a decent shotstopper but frequently parried it back into play when he made saves.

With the 2nd last night it looked to me like he could easily have made the save but was trying to push the ball out to the the side and made a complete hash of it.

[Royal Rother]

I am getting a lovely warm feeling about this squad.

The football I've seen on TV and Stream is the most pleasing on the eye since the days of McGhee / Jim and Mick.

[Jano]

Have to be honest the goals look a lot worse on the replays. I thought the free kick was in the corner and had a lot more pace on it. Looked like he could have caught it to me. Didn't realise he had been anywhere near the first one either and the replay made it look like he should have kept it out. Not a good night for Al-Habsi.

[La Flama Blanca]

For those moaning about the attendance last night (19,435), have a look at some of the others: Fulham v Stoke - 9,100, Preston v Bournemouth - 5,643, Hull v Swansea - 16,268, Boro v Wolves - 13,368 and Sunderland v City not much higher at 21,644 and Leicester v West Ham 21,268. Given it was a wet and miserable Tuesday night and people knew it wasn't going to be a full-strength side playing I really don't think our attendance is anything to get upset about!

[Maguire]

Let's see how busy they all are for our next mid week encounter in the top flight.

That's a completely different product to watching a reserve side in the League Cup.

I wouldn't walk a mile to Tesco to get a free bottle of Cava but I might if they were handing out some Louis Roederer Cristal

[NewCorkSeth]

Al-habsi - 4
Gunter - 7 - defended well, wasn't challenged really and for me looked very composed!
Hector - 7 - tidy player we've lost.
Cooper - 7 - tempted to give an extra point for how well he played. Looked intelligent off the ball and strong in the challenge. Didn't look out of place at that level.
Taylor - 7 - impressive performance against a tricky winger. Had most of they're attacks coming down his side and mostly did very well.

Our defence was superb. As a unit we looked incredible. Closing down in particular was a highlight for me. Amazing improvement from the last 3-4 years.

Tshibola - 8 - New golden boy?
Fernandez - 6 - not bad, good range of passing but often tried something without reading his teammates movement. Some nice cross field passes.
Hurtado - 6 - struggled a bit for me. Good running and did the basics well but looked a little lost at times?
Piazon - 6 - talented but didn't fit the role he was asked to play. Not yet a starter.
John - 7 - I like him! Great attacking attributes. Looked like he was enjoying being on the pitch. Could be pushing for the first team soon.

Our one touch passing is lovely to see.our triangles were almost natural for the team and we played the ball out of danger several times with 2-3 short, quick passes followed usually by a good run or spell of possesion.
Blackman - 7 - good goal well taken and more importantly was tracking back all game to close down. Almost an 8.

Clarke has done great work in the market and on the training pitch. This game will only have given him a tougher question about what our strongest xi is.

[East Grinstead Royal]

The football I've seen on TV and Stream is the most pleasing on the eye since the days of McGhee / Jim and Mick

I didn't see a lot of that side, but few would argue that Coppell's side between 2005 and 2007 was the best we've ever had. I have seen signs that this year's team is being coached in a similar fashion (could have sworn I saw Bobby Convey and Kevin Doyle out there last night) and that, my friends, is a seriously good thing.

We are dominating matches in the first 45 minutes but not always making our domination count. Once we can start converting more of the first-half chances, we will break the opposition before they get the chance to re-group at half time.

[John Madejski's Wallet]

A couple of things, maybe a little bit of a reality check for the club and fans alike -
Everton last night played a formation and set up straight out of the Brendan Rodgers book of tactics. As someone who has unfortunately had to watch a fair few Tottenham games over the years, if there was ever a player less suited to playing right back than Aaron Lennon I've yet to see one. We should have been attacking them all day long down that side yet I only think we did it once, and we scored. That we didn't target him (why weren't we sticking Blackman on him from any goal kick for Al-Habsi to aim for?).

I agree with this bit.

Everton were struggling when we attacked their full backs yet we went through the middle the entire second half. Even more so when we were desperately chasing towards the end. It was frustrating to watch as Barry et al had that area shored up. There was a lot of space out wide, yet McCleary showed no inclination to go out there, he just wanted to crowd the middle with all the others, at times they looked like a group of schoolkids all chasing the ball. The odd time we did go at Lennon we looked dangerous.

Very weird tactics in the last 10-20min.

That said, though we looked bloody great most of the game, though jury is out on Hurtado for me (& Piazon). Guess they need games to get up to speed. Taylor & Cooper were class

[Pepe the Horseman]

https://youtu.be/DjLlgUq1yXg

Highlights. The second looks worse and worse.

Yeh, I thought it was bad when I thought it was right in the corner. Awful.

What a cross from Hello John for our goal.

[RoyalBlue]

Did well to get across? Wasn't that the side of the goal that he was meant to be protecting? If not, he got his wall completely wrong. What's more it wasn't just his finger tips but his hands that he got to the ball. He's not even good enough to be a back up keeper.

Maybe you should watch it again. It's blatantly the wall's side and he made good ground to get across. Having got that much on it he should have saved it, but people are only calling these goals howlers because they expect Al-Habsi to let in howlers. If it was Fed, McCarthy or Hahnemann there'd be some disappointment but nothing else.

I've watched it numerous times, including live and your argument is flawed. If it was the wall's side then his alignment of the wall was at fault. As you point out, whether he did well do get there or not, he did. He got both hands behind the ball, and should have saved it. It was a howler. The reason we would only be disappointed with the others (although it would still be a howler) is that they had plenty of credit in their bank accounts re saves already made and the absolute confidence that they would make plenty of other great saves too. Watch out Simon Sheppard, Al-Habsi is going to take your crown.

And an Everton fan who was at the game last night and has also seen the lowlights has just popped his head into the office to say, 'I didn't realise just how bad your keeper was'.

[Sanguine]

That said, though we looked bloody great most of the game, though jury is out on Hurtado for me (& Piazon). Guess they need games to get up to speed. Taylor & Cooper were class

Jake Cooper. Next breakout English defender, the 'new John Stones'.
Okay, maybe over-egging it a bit, but his performance last night was brilliant. He made a lively Lukaku look ordinary.
A shame in a way he isn't out on loan, as with McShane, Hector and (a fit) Ferdinand ahead of him, he isn't going to play much, after 15 appearances last term.

[RoyalBlue]

Did well to get across? Wasn't that the side of the goal that he was meant to be protecting? If not, he got his wall completely wrong. What's more it wasn't just his finger tips but his hands that he got to the ball. He's not even good enough to be a back up keeper.

Agreed. It was a pathetic effort.

I have no doubt that the rest of the squad will now be getting a little pissed off that their efforts are being undermined by 2 incredibly shaky 'keepers.

As ex professionals, Williams and Gooding were both certain last night that the Reading players would be texting each other re the unreliability of the keeper(s).

Also loved the way Williams took the pee out of chicken Dellor who admitted to being too scared to ask Clarke about Al-Habsi's mistake. When Dellor thought Clarke was on his way up, Dellor scarpered. True to his word, Ady didn't shirk the question and went in as hard as he used to on the pitch!

Dodgy keeper aside, it was a great performance from our team and a really enjoyable game to watch.

[Ian Royal]

Did well to get across? Wasn't that the side of the goal that he was meant to be protecting? If not, he got his wall completely wrong. What's more it wasn't just his finger tips but his hands that he got to the ball. He's not even good enough to be a back up keeper.

Maybe you should watch it again. It's blatantly the wall's side and he made good ground to get across. Having got that much on it he should have saved it, but people are only calling these goals howlers because they expect Al-Habsi to let in howlers. If it was Fed, McCarthy or Hahnemann there'd be some disappointment but nothing else.

I've watched it numerous times, including live and your argument is flawed. If it was the wall's side then his alignment of the wall was at fault. As you point out, whether he did well do get there or not, he did. He got both hands behind the ball, and should have saved it. It was a howler. The reason we would only be disappointed with the others (although it would still be a howler) is that they had plenty of credit in their bank accounts re saves already made and the absolute confidence that they would make plenty of other great saves too. Watch out Simon Sheppard, Al-Habsi is going to take your crown.

And an Everton fan who was at the game last night and has also seen the lowlights has just popped his head into the office to say, 'I didn't realise just how bad your keeper was'.

Maybe I just expect to see far worse from him at some point and want to leave myself somewhere to go. I'm not arguing he was faultless or anything. The main point there was that it certainly wasn't his side. I've no idea whether he set the wall up right or not, but he clearly started off centre to the other side.