 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of ToffeeTVUSA. I am your co-host, James Boyman, joined as always by my fellow co-host, Ryan Williams. How are we doing, Ryan? Hanging in there, huh, Miss? Looking forward to another episode. Indeed. Me as well. Spring has sprung. We have the final third or so of the Premier League campaign awaiting us. And so the topic of this episode, we're going to look at the current table as it stands. Projections using performances so far this season. And we're going to dig into the teams that we're competing with for those elusive European places, rate the difficulty of the schedules, circle back and then talk about some of the injury problems that have persisted. And I mean, frankly, just hamstrung, no pun intended there, Everton's season and general hope. So big introduction on ToffeeTVUSA. Today, we're going to try to introduce some graphics here. So bear with us for any technical difficulties. But let's get into it, Ryan, right here. Yeah, here we see our current table just to kind of level set things. Technically, we are tied, but Liverpool's above us on goal differential. You know, that frustrates us. We'll fix that later. Indeed. But yeah, I mean, look at it and say, I mean, the biggest takeaway here is that in previous years, that seventh position is a decent one to be in because typically, you know, the winner of the cups would push down that extra spot into Europa. But because of the second competition this year, the sixth spot is the one that can get Europa because the winner of the Caribou Cup goes to Europa, too. Not that that is the worst thing in the world, but it's far and away, a lesser competition. So, I mean, look, the goal was at the beginning of the season when we broke down everything is how to get to that sixth spot. That's really what we were shooting for. And we're not in the worst position in the world, at least looking at the table on the surface. Yeah. I mean, look, it's not whenever from the top of the table, four or five matches into the season, it's not as low as 12th or 13th as we have been. It's just been kind of a crazy year. You look at there is some differentiation and some separation taking place right now, but it is still very, very tight with nine to 10 games to go for most teams and Everton are very much in the thick of it. Now, the question becomes what what does that look like for the remainder of the season? And so we move to our next slide where we look at projected points, essentially using the existing points per game from the matches that have been played thus far. And you can see with that, Everton actually move up one spot ahead of Liverpool, based on current trajectory into that seventh place spot, Ryan. Right. And it just shows you how tight things are. But what I think is really noteworthy is if you really think about it is if we're projected to hit just over 62 points, that's a pretty big number. I mean, I think, you know, we went and looked in the past in terms of what the average points total was for that sixth spot. I think the last five years we determined the average is 64. But there's tremendous variability between that. I mean, last year, I feel like Spurs got it with 59, which is not high. And then Manchester United four years ago, 69. That's a big number. And so when you look at it, you know, you're thinking that 62 points, still a decent point number. I mean, look, we haven't hit 62 points since Roberto Martinez's 2013-2014 side. And frankly, that's more points than the side that David Moyes got into the Champions League in 2004-2005. Now granted, they had a negative goal differential, which wasn't good. And the underlying metrics on that team wasn't good. I mean, don't get me wrong. It wasn't helpful that after we had clinched the Champions League that we got just absolutely hammered 7-0 by Arsenal in match week 37. That's probably not a shining moment for Everton, I think, in glory. But yeah, and I think the biggest dropoff is that six to seventh in the past has been big. So I think this year, what we're going to see is that seventh number is going to be pretty high. The sixth number may not be as high. But look, the competition is still great. However, the one thing I will say is Vila and Arsenal in its four points back, we've got a game at hand on both those guys. I mean, we would have to tank in order for them to really come into play here. And again, we're talking about getting six. So I mean, that's really the angle we're going to look at here. So if we're not going to go into detail with Aston Villa, even though we play him twice in Arsenal, that's why we're talking about, OK, what needs to happen in order for us to get sixth? I don't even want to entertain the idea of us tanking and getting worse. So I right. So what matters is it's not what projected points is based on what we've done in the past, because that's all that is. It's simply taking points per game and projecting it to the end of the season, giving you an idea of historical values. What really matters is who we got left and who our competitors got left. And what those schedules really look like. That's the stuff that really matters. And and some of it's pretty interesting and pretty insightful, I think. So without further ado, let's maybe head into the schedules. Yes, let's do that. We'll start right here with everyone's favorite across the Park Club, a.k.a. Least favorite, a.k.a. Arch Nemesis, Liverpool and you look at Liverpool's schedule and, frankly, probably the easiest of the bunch here. I mean, they've got Arsenal. They've got Villa who, you know, if they want to do us a bit of a solid here, we'll repeat that seven to dropping from earlier this year. Leads, you know, unpredictable, but you'd have to think they'd have the quality Newcastle in free fall, basically, with Steve Bruce at the moment. United, the, you know, that'll be a the Northwest Darby. That's going to be a tricky game, you know, United have shown good form of late. But then they've, of course, to wrap things up, got a very easy run out with West Brom, Burnley and Crystal Palace. The only factor in there that's worth noting is that they've still got a series with Real Madrid in the Champions League. So that is sandwiched in there between the Arsenal Villa and then the Villa Leads matches. And look, they're not playing great Liverpool time. So it's not insane that someone could maybe, you know, upset them along the way. But man, when you start looking at these other schedules, I think Hamas and I both universally think this is this is the easiest of the of the four that we're looking at, including Everton. Yeah. And I just think as a last note on Liverpool look, depending on if they are able to get past Madrid, you know, those fixtures will can the Champions League fixtures will continue. They're not the deepest side and Klopp seems to be, you know, willing to rotate guys as as necessary. But now, sure, of course, you know what I mean? So how long will that continue and how sustainable is that for the remainder of the campaign remains to be seen? That being said, I mean, if they don't get the Champions League, which they're looking pretty unlikely to do that, you know, that that could be a massive impact to them. Because when you're looking at projected points, I mean, for them to get fourth, I mean, Leicester is projected at like 73. Liverpool is predicted at 60. I mean, that's a big gap to fill. Chelsea would be in that fourth spot. And man, do we really see anyone overtaking Chelsea on their form now? Definitely not at the moment. I mean, just the renaissance under Thomas Tucho has been quite something to witness and they don't look like they're going to they're unlikely to concede much less lose very many matches for the remainder of the year. So it's a tall task, but you look at the other schedules and you have to think that Liverpool is comparatively pretty easy. And so with that, let's look at Spurs here, Ryan. And I think they've got some tricky games left for sure. Yeah, the depiction here that we don't know when that South Hampton match is correct, I believe they also have a cup match with Man City as well. That's not on here. So that interferes with their schedule slightly. But yeah, I mean, look, they've got a couple that you would think are cakewalks, but man, there's some tough matches there, too. Obviously, the Everton match looms large. The whole advantage doesn't matter as much, man. I wish we had people at Goodison for that one. And look, the underlying performance metrics don't look great for Spurs, too. So it's not to say they're going to roll over anyone, but there's a decent chance that Lester match might not matter to Lester at that point. I mean, they look real good if they're in the Champions League spots. And I mean, Sheffield, I mean, they're kind of tanked. And look, they've got Wolves and Villa. I mean, those are interesting matches. But, you know, I, you know, there are too many cakewalks in there, too. But certainly that's a little more challenging than Liverpool's matches. Yeah, I think so for sure. I mean, and especially, I mean, the match that we have was Spurs could be pivotal for how each of us finishes in the campaign. And I think Sheffield obviously looked nailed on to go down since Sacking Wilder, they somehow got worse, but the interim manager in there. And, you know, you never know what you're going to get was Spurs on any given day, but they do have a kind of similar underlying metrics with us in the sense that they're neither are particularly good. Yeah. Well, the one thing that's worth noting is, though, that I think some of these are doable, though, you know what I mean? This is not insurmountable. I think the next one we're going to look at West Ham, and I know everyone's been giving them plots for playing so well under David Moyes. This is the one I look at that I think might even be a little more difficult than Spurs. I know there may be a couple easier matches in there, but I just there's some matchup problems, I think, for West Ham. And I think it's reason to think that they may come back to the pack a little bit as well. Yeah. I mean, they've been the one team that you just kind of like really West Ham are going to are going to be up there this season. Like no disrespect to David Moyes. I think he's done a tremendous job getting them to the point that they're out, but you look at the remaining fixtures. Look, can't see them getting points off Chelsea. Obviously, playing us is going to be huge. Brighton playing better as of late, but that could change dramatically over the course of the next month. Wolves won't be easy either away. Not for them. Not for them. The way West Ham wants to play behind the ball and stuff. And look, you know, like Leeds, for example, who are terrible on set pieces. West Ham's leading the league with 11 set piece goals. No one's even close to them. I think we're at seven. We're at second with seven. You start looking at some of these teams are pretty well drilled. Even a team like Newcastle, that is going to come out in pressure him a little bit, but we'll tuck back in. It's not as easy for West Ham to break these teams open. You know what I mean? They have some similar problems that we have in that regard, or at least that we've had. But yeah, I don't think some of these are going to be too terribly easy. It's just not an outfit that I see. Like Burnley, for example, Burnley is really tough on set pieces. They've got to play in the turf more. I mean, I think that's a trap game for them. So anyway, and we still play them. So again, notice one key theme here. I wish a lot of these teams were playing each other. They're not, but we're playing every one of them. I think that's absolutely really important, unfortunately. Yeah. And I mean, look at the end, though, those last two. Those aren't those aren't looking too tough, frankly. And, you know, you wonder, you never know how teams are going to react when they get to the end there and the games really don't matter. Yeah. And I think that's a good segue, but just one last word on that. I just, if it comes down to the last and it very well could come down to the last match of the season for places, you know, for five through through eight or nine, honestly, and there could be a lot of movement and you could have half of the top sides who have already sitting pretty in Champions League or European places really not have to field strong sides. So it could be a very interesting last couple of weeks, as it always is. But without further ado, let's go to Everton's remaining schedule, Ryan. Now we've talked about already the importance of beating the sides around us. And so that would, of course, be the Spurs match would be the West Ham match. But we also have to play Villa twice. And I don't know how, you know, we talk about the metrics a lot and they're kind of an unknown quantity in terms of how Everton would line up against Villa, having a good season so far. But we really truly control our own fate based on this fixture list. And the bottom line is we're going to play a bunch of teams here that are tougher to break down that aren't necessarily going to be expansive against us other than Brighton. I mean, Palace is going to sit back, you know, in Roy's typical, you know, typically a 4-4-2 or almost a 4-4-1-1. So we're going to have to figure out ways to break them down. We have to win these next two. We have to get six points. I mean, yeah, we got a game at hand, but, you know, our kind of scrunch schedule doesn't happen until a little bit later. It would put pressure on teams, too. And then you've got the sequence. I mean, you really want to see if we're if we really are interested in European spot, Spurs, Gunners, Villa, twice. We don't know when the second one is going to be scheduled in West Ham. I mean, that right there is your sequence. I mean, you come out, you get a couple truly six pointers against West Ham and Tottenham with the game at hand. That looks totally different. And look, the bottom line is you look and say, all right, we got Man City. Is that really a game at hand? Because they're just too tough and too good. Well, let's put it within context. Now, I believe the final of the FA Cup is I want to say it's on the 15th. And I feel like the Champions League final is on the 29th. So I don't know if Man City is going to make it or not. I like their draw at least this round. But if they do, I mean, there's a chance Man City is not going to throw their best guys necessarily in there. So it's not all completely lost. We may get something out of those matches. But the bottom lines, look at these teams. Wolves will sit back to pallets already talked about them. Spurs are going to be tough to break down. You know, Vila is the same way they like playing behind the ball and Greedless really can run with it very well and do some damage. And we've struggled with them a little bit in the past. I mean, you know, the real question is you look at this and say, all right, look, we're playing against the teams we're competing with. So that's probably a good thing if you're confident. But do we have reasons to be confident? That's really the good question. You know what I mean? Because we don't play well, it's not going to happen. Yeah, I mean, I think that's that's that's very well said. And I think, look, you're coming against some sides. We've beaten Spurs twice. You'd have to think going into that match, we feel pretty confident furthermore. It's at home, but it's going to have to be sustained consistency, which is one of the, I think, problem areas for Everton. The season has been inconsistency. And look, we people have maybe this is a good segue to the next slide, circling back on the initial numbers and kind of digging a little deeper. I mean, at face value, Ryan, just looking at Everton's goals for per match, I think goals against per match. You don't have a super great spread there. It's specially compared to the teams in our neighborhood. No, and there's some underlying performance metrics that we'll probably get into our next American Toffee podcast. And we really like to crunch the numbers and those to kind of look and understand kind of the root causes what's going on. But it's hard to argue with this. I mean, we're ninth in goals per match, 12th in expected goals per match, 1.2. That's not good, you know, 14th in goals against per match and 15th in expected goals against per match. I mean, I know when we get the lead, we pack it in and are successful in it. But, you know, the combination of both those things, it just isn't in there. And I would actually argue that I have more confidence in our ability to pack it in against the teams remaining in the schedule because the one advantage we have is none of those teams are really super high powered. You know, I mean, you know, there's no Chelsea on there. There's no, you know, I mean, Man City. But again, it might be a different Man City side. There's no Manchester United. So to me, the key is scoring. And look, interesting stat is when we've generated an expected goal of higher than 1.2, which is our average nine wins, two losses, two draws. I mean, that to me says it all. Again, there's lots of underlying reasons behind that. But to me, it's the goal scoring that's most important. And like I said, a lot of these teams we're going to be facing are going to pack it in at least against us and make it tough to break down. So the real question is, again, is there hope because at the beginning of the season, we were banging them in like crazy, right? Yeah. And I think that's actually a very nice segue again into kind of our next slide, which was a graphic put together by one of our loyal listeners, boss man, junior. And so this is a visual representation of the availability of five of, I think, our most important players, at least in terms of maintaining composure, scoring goals, certainly. So we have Hamas, Alon, Leucadine or Charleston and Dominic Cowart-Lewin for each of the columns. You can see in blue is the matches that they started in white is the matches they were unavailable, green being the matches that they were on the bench. And so I think that the very high level takeaway, of course, whenever Tim were top of the table, started the season when we had all those guys available much more regularly. Look, when all five have started, we've picked up 13 points out of a possible 15 points. And then as soon as those we start to see in the middle of the season, just how badly we missed them or at least how much they've been out throughout the course of the campaign. Yeah, it's a massive difference. I mean, these guys are the difference makers for us. We don't have to quarry on there because he's kind of been a mainstay. So the good news is all these guys are back. The bad news is that he is out. But I still maintain if it comes down to breaking teams down to me, just focus on that far left column over there at Hamas. I just think he is such a difference maker. You know, Carlo has been interested in playing Guilfee at Sigurdson in that 10-roll and the drop off there is just so absolutely significant. It's unbelievable. And I know people are really excited about the fact that Guilfee has four goals and four assists in the league, but really from open play, he's generating almost nothing. I mean, two of those goals are penalties. Three out of the four, one was from a direct, I think, corner. The other two, one was a bad corner. He missed it, came back to me, hit it in. And then the other one was in a short corner. So from open play, it's not happening. And the saddest part is, you know, one of the most important criteria, most important underlying metrics in terms of creation is shot created action, just because of the fact that shots are more frequent. You know what I mean? A stat that is more frequent in nature is somewhat more reliable and certainly more predictable. And the numbers are unbelievably bad, frankly, for Guilfee outside of set pieces. I mean, I believe he's 11th in shot created actions from open play P 90. That is worse than Andre Gomes, Seamus Coleman and Tom Davies. Now you could say, well, he's been playing deeper and stuff. He hasn't been getting the touches. Well, Hamas is about twice that and he's been getting fewer touches, at least in the penalty area. So that, to me, is the biggest drop off on the team whatsoever. I mean, we could get into it in more depth. Hamas knows that I have already done that numerically. But to me, he's the key player out of all of these guys. But at least some continuity would help us gel a little bit. And frankly, getting some of the other guys involved, Carlos really needs to take a hard look at maybe some of the other guys that have some elements of creativity and make sure they're in roles that make sense. We've talked about Alex Awobi's ability to create from open play. But do you really want Alex Awobi firing crosses in from deep? No, no, not his game, not his game. But when he gets in the penalty area like he did with Arsenal, he does damage. I mean, we're talking at the top end of the shots created, you know, an expected assist spectrum like he is a devastating player when he's in those type of roles. Another guy, Bernard, has been very underrated in terms of creation. So there are some options. There are some people that if Carlo dials it up the right way, we can have better possession, better progression. We can start to put some points back on the board. Decoy, we lose from ability to recover the ball. I get that things like that. But from an attacking element, a lot of the weapons are there. There are some reasons to be optimistic. It's just can Carlo put them back together again? Yeah. And I think just the continuity thing. Like if we could get the same or at least 10 out of the 11 same guys starting the rest of these nine, 10 matches that we have remaining. That goes a long way. You look at this chart and it's there's very little besides the first five or six matches of the season where there's been any sort of continuity. It seems like every other match, there's someone. Hamas is out with a slight injury, with a slight tweak. We've got Alan missed, obviously a huge stretch of time. Leuka Dean, same type of thing. Fortunately, DCL and Richard listen have been as available as frequently as they have been. But without those other guys in there, they struggle to get service. And so I think just having that cohesive unit in the middle of the park to Corey is a big miss. No question. I doubt that we'll see J.P.G. Jean-Philippe Gabam and return before the end of the season. But we might, depending on how things go. But even some of these on this chart, too, when we didn't have many people like that Wolves match, we really had no business getting anything out of, you know, we just weren't creating enough, you know, that Sheffield match that we did win. I mean, that's more of a byproduct Sheffield being bad. But, you know, for example, people point about West Ham being so great this year. Well, look, they have some very particular players that make sense in the Moyes style. Sue Check and Declan Rice being the two. Well, those guys have had like 29 starts in the league. It's very easy when your spine is all healthy and together to build something. You know what I mean? That's so important. And when you've had that sort of continuity, we talked about how Great Southampton looked at the beginning of the year. Why? No one got hurt. You're playing the same system with the same people. And the bottom line is when you start, you know, peeling away at the depth, we've had a lot of injuries at the same positions in the middle. Yeah, you know, you wonder why Liverpool is not playing as well because they had a lot of injuries in the same positions. It does make it hard. There's a reason why they were giving up a lot of goals. There's a reason why we have not been consistent because in the middle of the park, we haven't been there, you know? And that includes Thomas, our main source of creation. Yeah. And so I think that is a good place to wrap our little visual experiment here on Toffee TV USA. And yeah, I mean, I think just reflecting on the season and reflecting on I think some of the frustrated, maybe not entirely negative, but frustrated sentiments across the fan base with our quote unquote style of play. I think that you have to take into account just the resources that Carlos had to to deal with. Yeah, we brought guys in in the summer. But look, a lot of those guys haven't been available. Even the guys that Marcel Brands has brought in that have solved a lot of the preexisting problems haven't been available. And so he's had to kind of piecemeal, jigsaw puzzle, a lot of these lineups together and put guys in roles that maybe they're not extremely well suited for and to get for the sole purpose of getting results. And look, he's done that despite a lot of the underlying metrics saying we should be nowhere near the position we're in. And so he had to tip the cap to the guy and you got to wonder what and frankly, salivated the prospect of what he's going to be able to do when he actually has a lineup that's built in his image and in the vision that he has for Everton Football Club. Yeah, but the bottom line is there's still a lot to play for this year. And look, we're in an advantageous position. All things considered. You know, you look at some of those underlying metrics. They don't look good. The fact that we're sitting there just right there. You know, everything is within our grasp. Yes, it's right there. And look, I don't know what people were expecting this year, too. I think at the beginning of the year, we said, you know, seventh is probably the expected sixth would be awesome. We're right there. We're right there. And some other people have over-formed their expectations, too. But there's a lot to play for still. We're in a good spot. It's just a matter if we can turn it on. And I'll tell you what, these next two matches, if we can get six points and start to roll here. This is, you know what I mean? You kind of look at like to use a college football reference. You never want to open up necessarily on the road against some brutal team. You know, you want to get warmed up. You want to get rolling. You want to build it. This is kind of a way to reboot after an international break. We've got palace. We're going to see a lot of the ball. You know, Brighton is going to be more wide open. I know they're playing well, but I mean, these are the matches where we can hopefully get some flow back, get healthy, get energized and start kicking some tail. And then we go into that stretch. And that's when it's really on crunch time is coming, folks. Yes, sir. It's certainly going to be a roller coaster ride all the way to the end, but I look forward to it, despite the fact that, you know, it's always the prospect that it ends in misery as it so often does. But I prefer to remain optimistic and hopeful that we will achieve Carlos, as he stated many times, objective of getting into Europe for next year, serve as a springboard and maybe have a little bit of cash to play within the summer, potentially on there's, of course, the news about the easing of financial fair play. Now, the Premier League regulations still remain in place. So there's, you know, tune into the escrow and those other guys for a deeper dive into the finance side of things. But I think that's going to do it for us on this episode of Toffee TV USA. Ryan, any last words? Absolutely not, you know, just it's going to be a heart attack the rest of the way, but we wouldn't like it any other way. Indeed. Well, thank you everyone for listening. If you are not already subscribed to Toffee TV, definitely go down and click the subscribe button. Click the like button. Leave us a comment if you enjoyed the show. Definitely check out our link tree. L-I-N-K-T-R-E-E slash USA Toffee Pod. It'll be in the description to find the American Toffee podcast, the show that Ryan and I do on a regular basis will be coming out with a in depth numbers breakdown of Everton's performance so far this season, even more in depth than we did today. We like to dive into those sorts of things over on that show as well as do post-match reviews and other sorts of content from time to time. So we do hope that you will check it out. Otherwise, Toffee TV, I appreciate them hosting us as always and until next time, up the Toffees.