 Welcome to ToffeeTV, it is the final word Everton nil Sheffield United 2. I never thought I'd hear myself say those words. We are joined by one of our patrons, Stuart Lowe, who has come all the way from Sheffield to give us his thoughts on the game. A bit of a weird crossover. Paradox that is, but Stuart will be giving us his thoughts on this game. This video is sponsored by The Athletic. The Athletic have some of the best writers around, a world class collection of writers like Paddy Boyland and Greg O'Keeffe covering Everton. Covering all kinds of sports. The best coverage of Everton Football Club is well anywhere. Completely ad free. The platform is completely ad free. The platform is brilliant by the way. I've got it. Baz has got it. It's tremendous. And you get proper devoted Everton coverage as well. From the likes of Paddy and from the likes of Greg. And hopefully we'll be having those two lads on soon to talk about what is going on at Everton Football Club. So if you want to join up, sign up for The Athletic. The link is in the description. So go ahead and do that. Thank you very much. Baz, what are your initial feelings now? Mundi, calm down a little bit from Saturday. What's going through your head at the moment? It's a weird one. Mundi, the tactic stuff for Payton this morning. Your eyes, when you come out the grand, your eyes tell you one story about the game, don't they? And your emotions. And when you actually look at the numbers behind the defeat. Doesn't make me feel any difference. But it makes me realise that it was a smashing grab really. However, the caveats of that is it's coming six days after a non-performance. That's what I was going to say to you Stu. In isolation, is it one of those games? I remember almost like the worst one I can remember. I say worst one. But the one where I actually walked out the garden, a lot of people felt the same. Remember when we got to Sunday on Boxing Day, when Martin is in charge. And we were playing pretty well and it was one of those days and everyone just went, you know what, that can happen. And everyone was sort of fine about it. It was completely out of context with the way we've been playing. Well, you're not going to be fine over the feet, are you? No, no. Sorry. Me shaking my head was Saturday wasn't bad. No, no, but I'm saying Saturday was a result like that. But in the context of the recent performances and the make-up of the team, it doesn't, it's never going to sit like that, is it? Well, no, not really. Not in my opinion. I think, I think taking it in isolation as a sole game at Goodison Park with a record that we've got of winning the last six, I think you could look at that and say, isolation and you could go home and not be happy that we've lost. Unwrap what went wrong and then move on for the next game. But because of what preceded it before that and how we got to this game and how we performed at Bournemouth, Crystal Palace, etc. Villa, yeah, you know, we should be way up there now. And I think you're right in that context. It's not an isolated thing and that's where the concern is creeping in now with fans. Obviously, that's the way I feel at the moment now. But yeah, absolutely. I think that the Sunderland game you were talking about, that day we played really well and that was, no, I was there keeping my great shape. Saturday was just so strange because they, we just had it, we had all of all, they didn't want an attack and we still couldn't carve anything. Do you know what I just remembered from that game actually? And I thought it was quite ironic is that I remember Martin is coming out after the game going, never win games of footy by just throwing aimless crosses into the box. Which for me just basically sums up ever at the moment. All we seem to do is throw aimless balls into the box. But you know what? I'm going to do something slightly out of character here. I'm going to defend Marco Silva. I'm going to do it before you do it because I'm going to switch the roles right. There's a lot of talk about Silva at the moment, about losing his job and about Marina, one end of the scale and Michael Ateter at the other end of the scale and there being no one in between. But you know what? I'm going to defend them because I think he is facing the worst case scenario at the moment. He lost two massive important players in Zuma and Garnet. And I think certainly the second goal on Saturday illustrated why Zuma was so important to us. Having that pace to get over and cut that ball out. Honestly, I think Michael Keane is still running trying to catch that lad. And so that's one side of it. But the other side is Garnet. And obviously in the last week he's been talked up massively because of his performance in the Champions League. Not only did he lose Garnet, but he brought his replacement in. Then lost him. He's lost Gomez in the last two games as well. So he's got Snidlin and he's got Delph, two players that he wouldn't have wanted to put together in his midfield. And you know, that's where I'll defend them because I think the players that he wants are just none of the club. And what can you do when you're in that position? When you're trying to fight fires, you bring, okay, one thing that people have said is you could bring Tom Davison to the team or you could change the shape of the team. And I think he could do that if he wanted to. It's just that he's maybe trying to settle the team down into playing a new system. Because last season, the end of last season, he had a system that worked, system he liked, played all the same players and we got results. We started the season with new players. He hasn't changed the system, but maybe that's what would come next once he beds players in. And I do feel that it's been, he has been quite unlucky with certainly not being able to replace players that he probably feels are really, really important to the way we play. And I remember saying this on deadline day about the centre back. And I know, you know, it was a case of, well, what more could we've done? I honestly believe the centre back position should have been a higher priority on the list for Marcel Brands. I really do. And I do think that he's mistaken, not the manager's mistake. They got the address to go on the situation by bringing Gabaminin. But unfortunately, if you pick up an injury like that, that's typical evidence, isn't it? So I don't know whether you feel the same. I thought that had to come from me rather than Bas being like, no, we've got to leave that. I do feel it's just been a genuine just series of things coming together that have meant that we haven't, especially with the start of the season as well, where you don't always play well and it takes a little bit of time. You know, and we've seen that from other teams. It's not just those struggling at the moment. Oh, everything skewed by Liverpool at the moment. Do you think? I don't know. Did I play this weekend? I didn't even notice. Right. And the reason I'm saying that for is because they've got a perfect record. But everybody else, City are brilliant and they've lost the game. But all the other teams are much, much, I mean, evident that the crisis is, we're a point behind Chelsea, who people are saying. And Man United. Who are saying Chelsea are like the best to get fourth. If we'd have won the two games, we should have done. We'd be second with City. And I'm not defending it because I still can't believe we've lost the last two games. So you have to put that into perspective that a lot of seasons begin with the unsettled period and then everyone settles down. It's frustrating for us that we've had a really favourable run of fixes and we haven't capitalised. But I agree with you. He's lost. The player who's probably the most important player for the way we play is Anzai Gomez because we haven't got another player like him in Armourfield. So when he's not in, we feel it massively. Garnett is obviously a big miss, but we knew that. Gabbaman, hopefully, will do that role for us and give us that physical presence in midfield. But even though I do defend Marco Saturday, I can't defend him because I wouldn't have started with two defensive midfielders at home to a team who was quite clearly going to come and just try and nick something. And I felt as though we needed to be playing on the front foot more and I think with Delphine Schneiderland, the tendency is to sit back a little bit. Yeah. I mean, to be honest, it goes to show, doesn't it, how many players that we feel Silver actually trusted from the first day he walked in. So, you know, to leave Tom Davis out now, but he used him more last season. And with the other players as well, when you're talking about holding midfielders, absolutely, we didn't need more than one to sit there because they didn't put the pressure on the window, but they didn't need there to, you know, rub out the pressure because there weren't any anyway, they were happy to sit back and take what we threw at him. But it just goes to show, like you said, Peds, about having people ready to come on to do a job that he wants to play a certain formation and hit the ground running in that certain way. Every season, so far, the two transfer windows is brought in probably six, seven players each window. And they've all come on and they're all first teamers. So, it shows how many he didn't trust from the batch that he inherited. So, he has been very unlucky in that sense that it's taken so long to try and get the players he wants and get them in. So, it is unlucky, absolutely, right there. Yeah. It's hard because, I mean, just on that front, we, the way we use the market, we are bringing players in late. And I think that I can't sit here and go, it's an ideal situation. But for the club at the moment, that's the way you have to work. Whether that changes next summer, maybe when there's a little bit more capital to play with, then we can, you know, and, you know, we've got players out the door. I don't know. Maybe that's just the way brands likes doing business. But it does hinder the manager going forward. And especially if it doesn't work like it didn't work this summer, we're not getting that centre back because I think it showed on Saturday when a team tries to just counterattack, you do not need that little bit of insurance at the back. And that's where maybe you do change your centre back partnership and say, well, you know, today, we can throw more men forward because we've got that pace at the back and not going to be exposed. But going back to what you were just saying there about the 2DM, you're absolutely spot on. I have no idea why he played Sniadlin in this game. It's just, it completely baffles me why you would play Sniadlin at home against Sniadlin. He's both just said that, you know, are going to just try and hit you on the counterattack. What are you going to offer on the counterattack? You say to Delph, you be the last player, you sit, you do that way, you can do that all day long. In fact, a lot of people like think Delph is that kind of player anyway. And then you add someone else in midfield, whether it be a Woby. See, this is the mad thing. Why are we dropping a Woby for the Bernard? Like, you can play both though. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. You can play both. It was the right decision to bring Bernard in, but it wasn't the right decision to play the 2DM. You can play a Woby and say to a Woby, right, you could say to a Woby, you play deeper, say to Sniadlin, you play a little bit deeper. Let's have a flat 3, but load your creativity and a little bit of speed in there from a Woby. Bernard then can play higher up the pitch, or Charleston can play higher up the pitch. And suddenly at home, we're a lot more attacking and we can go through the centre of the park there and we have a player in a Woby, I think, can drive up teams. Because I think that's one of the massive things we're missing, is a player in the middle of the park who can pick that ball up. And we haven't really had it since Ross Barclay left, whether you've rated Ross Barclay or not. That's what he did. We've not had a player who can pick the ball up and just drive. And I think, I don't know whether the manager's just waiting for everything to fall into place with Pearson now, before he changes the system, but we can't go on playing this formation, especially when there's players out. It doesn't help anybody. You know, we started the game first 20 minutes on the front foot, and then what happens is like it always happens at Goodison. Everything just calms down and we take our foot off the gas and then once it goes slow, all it does is help the opposition to just creep back into the game. Now we're just going to say, it's like, I've read a few times in the media that we think that we're better than we are, and that's why we lack tempo and pace. And I totally agree with that. And I think that that's one of the problems, whether it be a way. And we think that because we've got the squad that we've got now, we can walk over these teams like, you know, our neighbours and Man City and Tottenham can, and we go on, we're not there yet. We're probably three, four, five players away from that, potentially. So, yeah, sorry, that's going on. You know, I've seen what you're saying. That's almost the problem when you watch Man United, what Dave got. They're exactly the same. Dave, and they're in a position where maybe they do this, but they look exactly the same. They look at a team that think they're better than they are, and they haven't got a way of playing, whereas other teams like Sheffield United, they've got a way of playing. Norwich have got a way of playing. There's loads of teams in the Premier League that seem to have a way of playing. That suits them. And it doesn't matter who the person is. Yeah, we're the other way around. We don't have a way of playing. And yet we've got players that you'd go, oh my God, they don't like them. We've had a way of playing last season. We've moved away from it. We've moved away from what we were doing. But did it work against the teams that were actually below us, or did it just work against the teams that were above us that came to us? Well, it was better when teams were attacking us because we played a bit more on the counter attack. And because of the players we've got, we'd be able to get in behind them. It is a problem. The low block is a problem for everything, you know, teams that come and ship. But what Dave, Sheffield United did exactly what, you know, me and Andy done the preview last week and talked about what they'll aim to do, because it's what they do. And they've done exactly that. They've funneled us into wide areas and just dealt with every cross. Got three centre backs that added everything away. We put 42 crosses in over the week on Saturday, 42, which is big and their centre backs just added everything away. We're two stagnant when we're putting crosses in. Our players just go and stand next to this. There's no movement. There's no spinning. You're able to look at our positions, our average positions, the Charleston, Keane and Sigarton are bunched up on one side and there's a huge gap and there's Bernard and Dean on the other. And there's just a big area. And because we've got two centre midfield players that didn't want to hold hands, which is what he did. And he didn't really want to get up to the edge of their box. There was just a big bit of pitch that wasn't used. And against those kind of teams, you have to try and go through the middle. If they're forcing you wide because they want to put, they want to defend crosses, go through the middle. You look at us, I think we went through the middle 20% at the time of something at the weekend, which is nonsense against the team that formals you're into those wide areas. So that's a problem that he hasn't been able to address from me. And hence why we struggled the last two games. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's down the channels. If you think of our squad, Coleman, Baines, Davies, and a couple more to side, everyone's six foot plus their units, the big and whether they've, that's been one of the characteristics in the, in the, in the stats when they've looked for players. I don't know, but we're not using them. No. Why do we fear set pieces, crosses, free, whatever it might be, so much with so. They're set. So they go on that if the first goal, which basically decided the game really. Yeah. We had, we had, we had six corners at that point, I think, and every single one is just floated in and it's just dealt with their corner, that first corner that they scored from. Right. So there's obviously, we can talk all day whether people think was a foul or not on the goalkeeper. I personally thought that if the goalkeeper had put more of himself into it, he would have got a foul, but it, because he goes sort of half-hearted. I think a lad just leaning, you aren't going to get a foul for that. You know, but if he goes flying in, then it almost looks like there's a big collision and he'll get a foul for it. But that corner was so dangerous. It was putting such a dangerous area fired with so much pace that, you know, all it needed was to miss the first man and then obviously it ends up it meaning on the, on the back almost and just going in. But I was just like, everything's just, again, it's that idea of like going back to, oh, you're too good for it. We're just putting in corner after corner, same corner, no alteration, no imagination. No one run out and going short. No one, you know, remember when we played Villa, there was one that went to the edge of the area that got it volleyed. I've not seen that reteam. It's just the same. And every time or what happens is it gets headed away, go to the edge of the area and it's like, what do we do now? Their first one fired because their manager's obviously gone. Right, we need, we need to be, do something different in the Premier League. We need to awaybame to score goals. And then this, this is another criticism of, again, it's like, how important to set pieces to everyone because team at the top of the league at the moment, every set piece they put in, they seem to score from, you know, because they understand that it's a huge part of the game. City value, City Pep Guardiola, he values set pieces massively because he knows in a tight game, it can be the thing that changes it round and away you go. And yet we don't seem to value them and Sheffield United have come in, face corner, bang, it's in the back of the net. And then you're like, couple of minutes before half time, you're like, oh my God, Gullison's flat. And it's like, how do we take this around? You go in half time, they're buzzing, get men behind the ball, lads. That's all we've got to do. That's the fighting spirit. And they went on and done that. And that's, that's the problem with ever, like you just said before, some players think they're better than they are. There's no spirit. There's no tempo. There's no fight. There's no, no one on the pitch going, you know, what are we doing? Where are the leaders? Where's the, where's the, the drive and the fight to get back in these games? It's, it's so obvious that players think that we should be here and we're still down here somewhere. And that's a dangerous mix that I find because that's when you do, you don't necessarily see what's coming ahead here because you think everything's going to be okay. You've got to fight your way out of trouble, haven't you? Whether you think we're in trouble or not. I mean, I do because I look at the way we play and go, geez, it's going to be a slog to get us back to a level that we can be consistent to. Yeah. It's, it is weird because we, you know, you've got the manager at the end coming out going, we got battered there. I don't know why we've won the game. You know, we've had Dean, the Smith, the Philly coming out going. I don't know why we won that game. Everything should have won the game. You know, that's two managers already. You've come out and said, I'm not sure why we won it, but we did. He was laughing Chris Wilder was like, we play great against Southampton and lost. We've come here being battered and won. Like, I don't know why we're working. It's funny, old game, but I don't think we did batter because Henderson didn't have to make any real saves. He made a block from Luca Dean in the first half and a header from the Tiala, which was awful. And other than that, he had nothing to do. Now, okay, we had all the ball. We had all the, you know, huffing and puffing and throwing things in. They defended really well, but there's no, you know, we, even the couple of minutes before half-time, you know, there was a little response, but it was half-hearted almost. You go in at half-time and you think, like, you'll get into the meet. They'll come out, first 15. They'll be all over them. Fast, furious. Come out and it was just like, pass it, pass it, pass it. And when it gets to walk and pace, you're not going to break down a team that's got 10 men behind the ball. You're not. And that's all we do. Absolutely. That's the thing, isn't it? Pace, you can't teach someone pace. You've got it. They're just not using it. And who instigates how fast the tempo is, you know, that should come from silver and obviously a captain with either got a weak captain that's not rallying them around and ginging them up on the pitch faster, faster, you know, and trying to get that tempo going, I hate to say it, but obviously Gerrard used to do that brilliantly at Liverpool. No matter what the manager was, he got them G'd up, they were in the faces and every club wants someone that can do that. Keen did it at Man United. Yeah, you spot some because I got a lot of criticism last week for it going on the radio and saying that I thought the manager wasn't showing enough passion or whatever you want to look at it. But you're right there. Who's at the side of the pitch or who's on the pitch screaming at players saying, move it faster, faster, get, because there are times that, you know, I'm sure we've all, we've all played football at one level or not, where you're just playing and the game almost is just like passing you by almost like daydreaming as you're playing and you need someone to go, what are we doing? Come on. You're the old, the old child to get out of bed and all that. Wait, if it's not the manager, why isn't he? Lewis Ball and Morty, why isn't he Duncan Fagus and whoever? Go, lads, come on, we're in the game of football here. Come on, let's get, let's get it. Moe used to get a lot of kisses and people used to say, he like, he's still on the sideline, like it was playing PlayStation, like playing FIFA, because he was almost like acting out every move. Come on, let's come on, move it, move it, film Neville. Where do you like it or not? It is that. If you haven't got a player on the pitch, who's, who's, who instigates the pace. I remember when Moe's came in and we had Graveson and Graveson before that had been a very average footballer, but suddenly then Moe's put him in this position where everything went through him and some of the games, like the second after him, those games were brilliant way and remember like, you know, like when Moe's had to come from behind and everything would go through him and it was like bang, bang, bang. And then after, to start doing that as well, it was bang, bang, bang, bang. And we don't seem to have that at the moment, we don't seem to have a player. And maybe where this is where Gomez can be really important to the team, where suddenly it's like bang, bang, bang, bang. Or maybe Ghana last season in a different way. We're just, we used to just run around, reclaim the ball and then get us going again. We don't seem to have that on the pitch, we seem to have a lot of players who seem to just want a player to say it in pace. We're trying to play, we're trying to play champagne football with Parnland players at the moment. It's just, everything is just slow, slow. And it just needs somebody to take the mantle and go, lads, come on, this is not, and it should be one of the players really. And it should be someone, I don't know, maybe that's where someone steps out the shadows and becomes, you know, a focal point for the team, but we don't seem to have that at the moment. I still think it's the make-up of the midfield. I think the make-up of them, you've got Siginton who's not quick at all. Snadlin who's not quick at all. And Delf who wants to be the orchestrator, you know, you look at him, he likes to drop off and get it and take it and pass it and get it back, diagonal and all of that. And that's great. But that's great if you've got two busy players ahead of him. No, I agree, I agree. You can pull people around. But on Saturday it was just, Siginton tried to drop off, put him dropped onto the right and it was get it wide and then get it back. It wasn't even get it wide and throw it in early, it was get it wide, knock it back. They were sick cross coming, either way. No-one's making nothing behind. You know, Moise Keane, bless him. He's a young kid in a tough league. We're playing him up front with three big airy arses behind him. Knocking it in, he's getting smashed in behind. No-one's giving him anything to run at. And then people are moaning, saying, he's crap, he's not good enough. And you're like, anyone would struggle in our team the way we play. We ease it forward. That once balls in front of him. But Charlotte isn't a winger. People need to realise that he's a striker. He's a wide striker. So what? Like Liverpool and City, what they do is when they attack down the wings, they forward, their wing is coming field. So they end up with three in the box. The two full backs bomb on and a couple of them in fielders go and they leave the triangle at the back of the two centre backs and it'd be for them or it'd be like Fernandino or Rodley for City, so they'd have to be. Everyone else would make up a seven. We don't do that. We get it to Dean and Bernard'll give him a back and then you look and people just go and stand like that. Coleman doesn't join in there. Ideally with Charleston and Bernard or a Wobby should never, ever cross a ball into the box, ever. They should be in the box. You know, when we play Wolves obviously we have Charleston score on his head and a Wobby score on his head. That's the way it should be. It should be Dean on one side and it should be Sheamus Coleman and this is one of the things why we've picked up on Sheamus Coleman last few weeks is if he can't do that job anymore then someone else has got to go and do that job. The full backs now, as it used to be, should be your wingers. So that with Charleston has got a higher position, Bernard's got a higher position and like you've just said there, it shouldn't be Moise Keane on its own. It shouldn't be Domino Carverloon on his own in the box. Where's the midfielder running through as well? So there's all these problems and it's coming from this formation and how we how we set up in games and you know the subs that we made in this game didn't help either. A couple of times on Saturday we put a good ball in and it got added to the edge of the box, no one to be seen. They just picked it up because we didn't have any midfielders. We should have had two camping the day on the edge of their box to run onto stuff and we don't. It's all we're looking for angles that aren't there. It's just very, very frustrating. Let's talk about the subs. What did you make of the subs? Because I mean I've been very, very critical. Like the first two, I didn't, I wouldn't have took Bernard off because Bernard was stretching the game. He was giving us natal shape and he took Bernard off and the shape went out the window. I agreed with the woby coming on. He brought on Jank Towson instead of Domino Carverloon which I was like, all right you know we might be able to do, but Dom had just scored a week before so that didn't really make much sense. I was glad he left Keen on because I thought Keen was getting dragged off, but we put Towson on and we put a woby on so straight away we lost the width because the woby likes to come inside. So that width wasn't there anymore so we didn't get the ball wide where it would have been able to put it if the Towson or Keen. So we almost lost that because Luka Deem is then having to do 80 yard runs and then obviously we lose a second goal because we've got all the ball. Everyone's like pushing on. We're trying to get as many attackers in the game as we can. They just clear the ball, play it wide and then they get bent in behind. Luka Deem can't get back and Michael Keen can't get back and Jordan Pickford for me was 100% of fault. He runs and puts the brakes on and allows the lad to just get their face and slot it under. We've either gone for it, Pickford either got it and he hesitated and once he hesitated, that machine knocked her under him and it was the only attempt the add-on had. And then he took Coleman off and put Walcott on and it was like, but where's Walcott? Why does he keep bringing Walcott on for God's sake? It could have been Tom Davis, it could have been Mason Holgate. The last two weeks with the subs, I honestly haven't got a clue what he's doing because what has he changed? Because the last couple of weeks, what he's done in a way is he keeps on throwing the kitchen sinker teams when teams are sad. All we need to do is just defend. When it should be, keep the shape, but just change the shape and bit of the... So, he takes Nadel on off. Why don't you introduce Tom Davis then into the midfield and say, Tom, start pushing from the midfield. Leave Bernadon and ask a Wobby to play gentle instead of wearing... See, what he could have done, realistically Saturday, was suck Sigarton off and Nadel on. For a Wobby alongside Delph and just left Bernadon and gone, you just, you only need two in there, you literally need two. You, be the man that breaks from midfield, be the eight that breaks and get to the edge of the box. Let's get it wired to Bernadon, let's overlap, let's get balls into our strikers so we've got two in there now, get the Charles in coming out and really make them have to think. We didn't, he just kept the same shape. Change the personnel, but a Wobby didn't want to stay out wide anyway because fair play to him, he likes to play through the middle, which is fine. Towson then wasn't going and doing the left hand side because he's not quick enough. And Moise Keane was still looking lost because he's the one that wants to run onto things and we just made it easy for them. What he should have done really was put Dominic on the Calvert Luminon because he's good in here and they had lads who were winning every edit. Young is all right if you're playing with someone else. Keane I think would have been happy, because Dom would have been able to knock things down and he'd have been able to run on it and I just didn't get that. It was, and then what he even could have done was when he sacrificed Coleman, he could have put Calvert Luminon in and just gone right, we're going three, four. It doesn't matter, Moise will finish with everyone off the run, but we didn't. I don't know how he perseveres, I really don't. I know he was a stalwart last season and you know, I don't know why he gave him half as many games as he did last season and he's persistently introducing him again and again, like for like, into down the flanking. Where's this, he were a golden boy 10 years ago, weren't he? He was like the next best thing and suddenly everything's hit at the keeper's legs. I don't know what's happened. I mean, I'm not going to spend more than two minutes on my world cup, but I've said it for the best part of six months. Why do you bring on the right? He offers nothing, he should be coming on the left. He comes on anyway. The only thing he's got left in the tank genuinely is that he's got the pace to cut in on his right foot. He can't beat people across, he just can't, so it's pointless. But I would honestly now, I would honestly take a serious look at this, look at it all and go, we might as well have Anthony Gordon on the bench. The kids go, honestly, honestly, you know that I don't, I'm not one for going, oh, someone's been bossed for the under-23s. I think now, with Sheffield Wenty coming up in the league cup, I think now is in it as a time just to get a kid like Anthony Gordon, who started brilliantly for the under-23s. And I would go, I'd start putting them on the bench and just having someone in there that fans can just be a little bit excited about again. Doesn't mean we have to play him. Doesn't mean we have to play him. But I'd certainly have him on the bench for the Sheffield Wenty game. And I'd look to have the kid getting ready to be just maybe being in there, so that in some, so if there's a case of a game where we are winning, say we were winning 2-3-0 against someone, I know, I know that sounds mad, doesn't it? Does now. But imagine we were, right, and you just say, there's five minutes to go, and you've got Wolcott, or you've got Anthony Gordon, you go, go on kid, get on there for your day, but you can't see what it's all about. And I would now because I think that's something that can, it sends a message straight away to your squad that I'm not happy with this, I'm not happy with any of you. So I'm going to bring a kid in from the under-23s, doing it, and it sends a message to your under-23s that there is a pathway, which seems to have been completely closed off in the last two years. And it says to the fans as well, I'm ready to do something a little bit different. And that's why I think that's not just a football thing, that's a mental thing, that's sending a message to everybody that I'm prepared to do things slightly different. Whether he will do that, I don't know, but persisting with people like, well, continually persisting with people like him is, I just think it creates more disharmony, certainly amongst the fans. Because we sit, Wolcott's come on, he's done nothing, right? And yet we're having a conversation about something, we're like, why does the manager persist with this player that we're all done with, we're all completely finished with? Now, he doesn't offer anything to us. And yeah, for the last three or four games, he brings mum with five minutes to go. Who's asked? Get a young kid on the bench and let's look prepared for the future. I mean, that's the way I look at it. I think the subs, he's throwing attackers on to try and get a goal because we need a goal. There's two ways you're looking at it, you can look and go, well, he's losing his discipline because he's just trying to throw everything at them. Or the more attackers you've got on the pitch, the better your opportunity to score goals at. But I still think it's, for me, it's the make-up of them in the field. And this isn't saying that Snidlin didn't do all right in that role, sitting in front of the back four, or Delft, because both the dashboards tell you that he did in terms of the passion ability and stuff. But it's not what we need. Because you can play. I've put his thing on in the tactic show and most of his passes aside. So I'm not saying he's not winning a tackle and passing the three yards, but we need people to go the other way, we need people up and down, we need people to run on past players. We do, we do. I think we lack someone in the middle, Pedro-esque or David Silver-esque, where they carry the ball between the lines, you know, pass the halfway line and play off, like you said, as the wingers go up and whoever's up front, if it's Moise Keane or Ray Charleston, or both, you know, one off the other. But we need someone, like you said, to drive through midfield. I don't know if I see Gomez getting that high up the pitch. It's almost like he tends to sit behind, well, this side of the halfway line in our half of the pitch. I don't think he drives enough, but I think he's good enough to do that. I think that comes down to where he's asked to play and what he's got around him. You know, when we played Villette, there was literally just him and Snidlin and Sigarton ahead of them. He's probably looking round going, I can't go bomb and round. Maybe if it was like he was playing in a three and you add someone with the energy, he'd start going then, thinking, well, I've got cover, it's fine. But maybe it's been asked to do a job and especially the way we play as well, if there are two sitting, they're probably told to just sit. But it's just not working the way the manager thinks it's working. A large part of that comes down to we allow Sigarton to have this free roll. And the problem is, when he's not scoring goals and when he's not making assists, he ain't doing anything and that's the problem. So you're playing games going, we're waiting for that to click. But it's not clicking because there's loads of places around the pitch. It's not clicking. It's not clicking with Charleston and Seamus. It's not clicking on the left because he keeps on changing it. It's not clicking up front because we've got a different forward every game. And they're both with my young lads and well, I'm trying to find his feet and I'm trying to find confidence. And there's so many just like... I'm looking with the two centre backs at the moment. It did, but now. You see, I think me and it was very good at the weekend. I think Keane looked a little bit like his confidence was taking a whack with that England thing, which isn't helping. I think when you look around a pitch with Sigarton, you know, I looked at his stats and his stats at 97% pass completion and he created two big chances, which I didn't see. But apparently, so you look at that and go, oh, we don't know, right? But the reality is, it's not the fact that he can... Yeah, he can put a cross in and we can score. You go, there's another assist for him. But he doesn't commit players. He's not pulling people out of position. He's not travelling with the ball and making defences after break, they're blocked, you know what I mean? It's all very samey. So when you've got him, you've got Sniadlin, you've got Delph. They cope with it so easily because what they did was they put the bashing just came out and sat on Sigarton. And so we had... Mantham and Mark then, he made a big six foot grog behind him when we were trying to attack, so Sigarton had no space anyway. Second half, he dropped over to the right, but Retialison and Coleman were there, so quite often we'd have three. And then he'd just throw an aimless cross in that, got it. That isn't helping us. We need someone who can drive, get into the penalty area like you're saying. If you want David Silva for City or Bernardo Silva, they drive into the penalty area and then he commit-players. Barclay did it for us when he was at his best. He'd drive into the box, now okay, his shots weren't great and sometimes his decision-making wasn't great, but he'd commit people so that LaCarca would have space or something like that. We don't do that now. We play in front of teams, so teams sit and go, go on then. But we did it the week before, just sat and went, go ahead then. We know you're going to dominate the ball. Everton have dominated the ball in most of the games this season. We've had all the play and yet we've lost 50% of our games. That's one of the big problems, isn't it? We very, very rarely have a player who drives into the box, which Arleson doesn't pick up the ball in an area to drive, but now he never picks up the ball to drive. But even if he did, you'd wonder how many players would be in the box if they were doing that. The full-backs are certainly Dean is brilliant, but he very, very rarely drives into the box. Shea must call me, she'll be a big part of this game. He doesn't do it anymore. Yeah, there's a lot of that for the manager. The caveat for me, though, is we've got a lot of good players in this squad. So I think if you just get it right, I think it can flower. Do I really? I look at other teams and people are praising Leicester. I watch them at the weekend. If space, that's second goals and nonsense. You're talking a millimeter, but he can't prove when the ball left the footer winks. So therefore he can't prove he's offside. That would have gone sooner. Leicester without Leicester would have devoid of all ideas. Got an equaliser fortuitously, and then he's evidently done. He pressed home and got the win. I looked at United yesterday, much of them, much of us. I thought Leicester looked well better than we looked. They play me confidence as well, but I'm straight. No, they're playing with the tempo as well. And they've gotten them, listen. And we'll see in May, won't we, where Leicester are and where Everton are. At the moment, they've got that bit of swag out about them because they've got players you can. But I watched a lot of that game and I wasn't impressed with them. Yeah, but they were playing top. No, no, I'm not making excuses for Everton. Everton were poor at the weekend. We've been poor all season. Let's be honest about it. What I'm saying to you is we've got, where is Leicester kind of know what they're doing? And I've got their players. Rodgers knows what his players are, what they're doing. That's why I think they... And I don't know why Leicester haven't done. Why is it took him less time to work that out than it took Silva to work out? That's got to be a question. Yeah, yeah. Rodgers has gone on. Rodgers has gone in there. And he's gone, this is the way I play. And you will follow the way I play. Where is Michael Silva's come in? And I'm still waiting for him to stamp what he wants on this team. I told him he was a 4-3-3 manager. And I'm still waiting for this 4-3-3. And what makes it worse is he bought the players. The players were bought in the summer to do with that. I think someone from the Athletic wrote a piece before about that going, why is a Wobie still playing in that position out wide? Wasn't he bought a place essentially? Everton had done nothing this season. And he was dropped. Instead of someone going, I'm gone. See, I fell over there in the number 10. Maybe it's time he gets dropped now. And maybe put a Wobie in there. Because that isn't what he was bought for. Yeah. You know, buying a player, a 24-year-old player, he's ready for the next phase of his career, the next club. And all you're doing is doing the same thing that he did at his last club, where fans were like, he can't play in that position. And then you swap on him out. See, I think he could be like, ah, kind of Madison. He's not quite the same. Madison's great at long-range stuff on that. But that kind of player, you can get it, say, and go with it. But they've bought him the same thing. They bought Oxley Chamberlain. And they asked the fans, like, ah, you're having a laugh on you. He went, no, I'm going to play him in Sedsman Field, where this energy is going to be really important. And he'll give us something different. And the next many people are raving about Chamberlain until he got injured, obviously. And then last season, I remember talking to some of them, and we were like, how are you going to get better next season? You can't go home by any means. We've got Oxley Chamberlain back for the start. That's like a new sign. Said, non-ironically, not in a Bill Kenman kind of way. And that's what Oxley Chamberlain should be for us. That's what, a woby should be for us. He should be someone who goes in the middle of the park now and can drag, like you said before, he doesn't want to stay out wide. We need that shape to allow Dean to get forward. At some point, the manager's going to have a big decision to make. Do you think he's just bowing to the Guilfy-Siggers and things? Is it because? Why is he though? But is it because Guilfy got goals last season? But he's not getting goals this season, and he's not creating goals. And you can't just, why did he buy this player? He said, I wanted a woby, I see a plan for him. You know, we know what we want from him. And he's going to be, see, I think if we've got Sahara, it would mean the Sahara would have played central as well, further forward. But I don't think he would have played the Sahara wide if we've got him. I think he would have played him centrally. But I just can't understand why he's not putting what is in print on the team. Yeah, that's... That's what, you know, if we're going to top up Brendan Rodgers, that's what he's done. He's gone into Leicester and gone, we'll use it all here, but you're going to play the way I want to play. And yet our manager seems to play the way that Everett managers have played for the last 10, 15 years. But why don't, that's got to be the million dollar question, isn't it? Why isn't he prepared to just say, well, this isn't working, so we're going to do what I want to do. You say to, you know, Guilfee, I don't want to drop it all on Guilfee because it's not necessarily down to him, but he can't be un-dropable. So if you take him out and you try a woby in there, then Guilfee just has to work hard to get back in. And if it doesn't work, then if it works on a woby, it's great. Then maybe it's Delft then that can't get in and Guilfee the place is over. We're not saying that Sigurdsson, that's it, he's done the minute he's out, it's over. Because that's not what a squad is, a squad is working to get in the team. Of course, yeah, I think as well, they look at it as an asset, don't they? He's an asset that they spent at the time a lot of money on. And even now, obviously prices have increased since we bought Sigurdsson, but back then, 45, 50 million, whatever we paid for him, hell of an asset and an outlay to then not play him. I think you're right, what your point you made earlier about, he's slow, he doesn't travel well, Sigurdsson. And people realise, I think, he's being sussed out by players who are getting right in his face. And unless the ball's at his feet, directly at his feet to do something magical with, he can't do it. And I think they're marking him out of the game. But he probably could do it, if he was fed that back. I think when you put him in a position, you're almost saying to him, you can cheat your way through games because you can just sit in his pocket and you'll get the ball sometimes and other times, you won't get it. And he presses, well, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying he doesn't run around because he does, but he's no influence on the game for the way we play. So therefore, if you drop them fed that back, he'd have to get involved in the game, he's a good footballer, Sigurdsson. So that might be a way to get him in, but then your front three have to stay higher. What's happening at the moment is, because he stays up almost like a second striker, he doesn't win any others, he doesn't turn and release Moise Keane, so he's cleaned through. So Retialas and Bernard are having to do doggy work to get back, which is fine. But then when we go the other way, our centre forward's isolated and Sigurdsson's there, instead of us being higher up the pitch, you watch them. You know, they break really quickly, Man City break really quickly. Spares, when they're at the best, break really quickly. But we are. Keane said if you're a day or Matty a day, we're too slow to get the ball into the final third. I look at the second goal and I wonder would ever do that, where you just ship a ball down the line and have a striker who's run onto it and then be in the box. And with Guilfee, Guilfee's never going to, you can knock them in, you can't put the ball ahead of Guilfee and you don't seem to have a centre forward, you can put the ball ahead of. So therefore, everything is always coming to the ball and with your back to the goal and then having to go around again and that's why maybe we have to put so many crosses in because you're coming back and then you're going wide and then you're putting it in and there's going to have to be massive changes. There really is with the way we play because it's just... I think that's what's hindering us. I think we've got a lot of good players and we've got good enough players to be challenging for the top six. But that means nothing if you can't get some consistency. B, show a little bit of bottle when you go away from home and C, if the manager can't find and probably the most important to the three, if the manager can't find a system at the way you're playing that complements the players you've got. The rest is irrelevant. It doesn't matter how good your players are, if you're playing, if you're too easy to mark the way we are, you're not going to win any game of football. No, for too many years we've lacked players in certain areas. We've always had a good bunch and a good heartbeat there of players, whether it be Kale and Arteta, but we have decent... A couple of good... We've always had a couple of good players, but they're not enough better players around to make up for the lack of money and being able to spend on those bigger players. And I think that, like you say, we have got the players now to get that four to six position, especially with Man United floundering. But going back to what you said about Leicester City, Rogers has done with Leicester City, gone in there with months, in months. And Silver had all those players... There were 40 players on the club's book when it took over and they've had to get rid of loads. So he had all those to choose from and probably 12, 14 that they brought in since as well. So probably 50 players plus that he's had to choose from in nearly a year and a half, coming up to a year at 16 months. And we've not found it, have we? We've not found that with information where that's Everton. I look at Everton and I don't really know how we still play. And at the tail end of last season, with the big clubs that we played against, I thought, that's Everton. That's Everton. That's us. I just wonder whether he's gone. He doesn't know his best team again, which is a problem. And I think, you know, if we're going to have comparisons with Leicester, everything the difference with Leicester is, they have a centre forward, that they can rely on to stretch teams. And you also know how to get the best out of Madison, whereas when you look at him play, when you watch him play, and you watch where he gets on the ball and where Guilfy gets on the ball, it's, you know, when Madison gets on the ball, it's seen his goal at the weekend. This got the energy, doesn't it? You get the ball, he got it out of his feet and bang it in and you never see Guilfy in those positions. Not recently, not this season, back in the last season. Maybe back in the last season, we were playing a little bit more direct. Dominic was knocking the ball off to Guilfy-Siegerton, higher up the pitch, and then Guilfy's got everything in front of him then. Whereas this season, like I just said before, every time he gets the ball, he seems to be facing a goal and not their goal. And suddenly everything's like, well, I've got to make it. Yeah, but what you do with the opposition, Manatee, there's just like, go and pick up Guilfy-Siegerton, cut that supply off. Cut the space off. He's not going to run past yet. You're not quick enough. So if that's all it takes to mark us out the game, then that's where you're on the team in field. There's all certainly another midfield after a run-back. You're on the team in field, there's a stand on the halfway line going. Yeah, it's good this, isn't it? Yeah, and that's the problem. There's no more, you can't just rely on a couple of plays to be your dynamic players. The best teams now, every position has dynamism in it, every position. You know, this is... Before we finish, do you think there's pressure on the Manatee now? Yeah, and it's the same reason why I keep on saying it every week, Baz, it's because people don't like him. Nobody don't, people don't like them. But the media, clarify it, the media don't like him. No, no, mate, there's loads of fans who don't like him. Let's not mess about here. Loads of fans do not like Michael Silver. There's no point in hiding from the fact. Fans do not, there's a section of fans, I don't know how large it is, so I can't quantify that. There's a large section of fans, I just said large. There's a section of fans, sorry, there's a section of fans that do not like Michael Silver. And like we said last week, it gets hyped up by your talk sports, and your Red Tops, and your Soccer Sant, Saturday pundits who don't like him as well, half of them are Allard Isis mates. They don't like him. Therefore, there's always two games away from a defeat. Fans latch on to it on social media and it just puts pressure on them, and it'll put pressure on them. And I say it every week, and the club, you're not seeing them to have a clue how to deal with it, because all we'll get this week is more rallying cries from the same old familiar faces that the managers, the club trot out because they know the fans like them, and it's the same every week. And it becomes stale. Instead of having the manager have a really good conversation about games, and I know he ties to be honest, but it just doesn't come across. So he'll always be under pressure whether he is or not. That's the irony. Stuart, what's your take on it? Is he under pressure in your opinion or is it too early for all that? I think certainly under pressure. I think for me, it's just just, with a Sheffield United result, gone over that tipping point for me. Nice, okay. That I saw with Martin as when that happened in Cooman, when you just know it's either going to be weeks, months, whatever, end of the season. And because it's so young in the season, I'm not so sure it is, I think he will be given that time. For me, I thought he was, I'll be honest, it wasn't someone that I wanted right from the start. And I did think he was very Martin as esk, in the 70% pressure and then teams nicking a one goal on the break. We're a bit of peace just hitting us off. Because against Martin, as they just picked us off, didn't they? We pressed so high. And although we're not as haphazard as that, and our defence is better than the Martin as era, I've given him a chance. And then obviously last season when we were playing, we were beating Leicester away and we're like, really played really well here. And I thought, although some of the results against the big teams, we had domination. We weren't killing and we're weak because we didn't have the goals. Yeah, Arsenal, we should have been back six or seven. Yeah, absolutely. But yeah, and we'd have 20 shots on goal, won't we? So for me, I'm just teetering off the fence into irreparable. You've just said irreparable. You didn't want him in the first place. I didn't. So therefore, you will always, your gaze for the manager will always be shorter for other people. And that's what I continue to say is that if people have already got this thing about the manager in the head, they're not going to give them as much time. And I don't know how you change that. I just don't know how you change that. I mean, the Sheffield Wednesday games, obviously massive. You know, when we've got Manchester City coming up as well, it's a tough time. And then barely away. The next three games, rightly or wrongly, could decide the future. And that's the way it is, isn't it? That's football. Because if you're far out in the city, you're looking at your investment going, I'm putting, and this club's spending a hell of a lot of money, our wage bills high for where we are. We should be finishing higher up the league. Of course. If we're, you know, we've had a favourable start, let's be honest this season, and we've got seven points from six games. So we've got to turn it round, and it's got to begin by, and the one thing I'll say for when we finish, you can get the fans onside a bit more by changing up the team and going, right, we're not working, we're doing something different, and this is what we're doing. And we're going with, you know, Sidderby's coming in, and Wobby's coming in, and I'm going to play Dominic Alvalu, and Moise Keane in the same team, or whatever. I'm going to mix it up a little bit and try to find a winning formula, and then we'll go from there. And if he does that, I think fans will go, all right, well, at least he's trying to use all of his tools. At the moment, it's almost like he's doing what he did last season, which is like, at such 13 players, and it's like, well, you've bought 13 players, so you don't trust anyone else that you had, but one of them's well-cut, which is bizarre. Yeah. So, yeah. It's big, I hope, listen. It's chef word, it's going to, I'm not massively confident, so I'm not going to lie, but it's a big, big difference. I mean, don't get me wrong, I hope Michael Silver massively turns it around. I can't be asked with more up-eval again, and more check. And also, I can't be asked with losing more games. I want to see him winning games of football. I do think there's a team in there, but for whatever reason, I just want Michael Silver to put his stamp on things and go, this is the way I'm playing. I've had enough of this now. I'm going to play the system I want to play, I want to play with a lot more. And as I can start, at the beginning, saying I do have sympathy for him, I do think the things that are supposed to, are strength. Don't mess this massive to us, we're no matter what anyone says. The strength from last season have been ripped apart. We're playing with a brand new midfield. The centre-back partnership where it's very clear that we're lacking in patience. As you said before, it doesn't help when you goalkeeper is flapping at things and it's not coming, you know, out and just going, you know what, I'm just going to make sure that when he runs through, I'm taking him on the ball, forget about it. If no one else is doing that, that, if Pickford runs full pelt at that lad, I don't even know that lad's name. So he's, there's no way he's going round that goalie and knocking it in. He's bottling that. He picked for stops, he picked for carries on, he gets it. So let's not put all, not put all the blame on the manager. Because it's not, definitely not players have got to take responsibility as well. We did have, we had some nice stats up for the screen and everything and we kind of be showing them. Because what does it matter? Because he don't change that, does it? One was a ball keen, one was a ball. Sni, was a snydler. Oh, okay. Time to dig in. Yeah. Time to dig in. Time to dig in and get some results. Yeah. To do it. There you go. Big thanks to Stu. Coming over. Love it. Did you come down the snake pass? I didn't actually. Do you know, I've never, I've never been the way before that I did come. Oh okay. It was alien to me to get any of it. It only took two hours to do 76 miles, so that weren't too bad. Two hours. And I got a cup of coffee as well. There you go. Devotion. He broke milk and loads of chocolate. And hobnobs. Which I'm sure you're on. Hobnobs. I didn't know my hobnobs. This is the code for different now, Eddie. Yeah. But I mean, they're not showbred, I mean. Well, the hobnob cakes. You know, they're not showbred. Showbred is the king of difference. For difference. Ah. Keeps it. Yeah. Slugged it. Slugged it. With links off, you see. Be good for centre back for us. There you go. Let us know your thoughts in the comments. Another day to forget at Goddison Park. Let's hope for happier times ahead. Thanks for watching. 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