Monday 11 December 2017

Who cares what it looked like? They were derbies!

Sam Allardyce is winning me over. Yes, Everton were poor at Anfield, but they fought hard and kept their shape under a lot of pressure in the 1-1 draw. The much vaunted Liverpool attack, managed only 3 shots on target from a 79% share of possession, albeit with some key players rested. Everton's possession share was their lowest in a Premier League game since the inception of these stats.

Allardyce did one thing the press predicted - park the bus - but not the other - pack the team with 3 experienced centre backs, which I thought would be a recipe for disaster against Liverpool's small, quick forward line. He retained Holgate (as I'd pleaded) who did well. He also kept Kenny, though that was not a surprise. The youngster from Kirkdale - you can't be born much nearer Goodison Park, Kirkdale is the nearest railway station -  was certainly Everton's best player in the first half, when it looked as if they didn't have anyone else who could actually play football. Indeed, some reporters had Kenny as man of the match, though others went for Rooney or Salah, with Calvert-Lewin also getting high marks. So Allardyce has passed my main test - would he play the youngsters when their form merits it? - at least for now.

Yes, he brought on Jagielka to protect the draw after Rooney's penalty, won when DCL( Dominic Calvert-Lewin) drew Lovren into a very foolish push in the back. A bit soft but no surprise that it was given. Despite playing in a handful of derbies in his first spell at Everton, it was Rooney's first goal for Everton against Liverpool. But I had no issue with that substitution in the context of the game.

More concerningly he brought on Schneiderlin, who's only contribution of note was to get a yellow card conceding a free kick in a dangerous position.  Schneiderlin is 6ft 1in tall but plays with all the physical presence of a midget. Sam needs to get this lad to play - or at least impose himself on the game a bit - or ship him out in January for someone better. I know which I would do.

Sigurddson also still has to improve to win me over, looking like a fish out of water for most of the match. £45 million was always an extraordinary amount of money for him, a sum I can't see him ever living up to, though that isn't his fault of course. I'm just judging him against my own arbitrary standard of whether he's good enough to wear a blue shirt, irrespective of the fee. The answer is still "maybe".

Sam went for good old boring 4-4-2, possibly feeling that it's still the system that most British footballers are most familiar with. The two banks of four proved hard to break down despite the limitations of Martina, at left back, especially.

Having said before the match I would settle for any score which saw us concede less than three, the result was more than enough justification for the poor entertainment on offer, which must have bored neutrals to tears.

But who cares what it looked like, at this particular juncture in Everton's evolution?

Indeed, I've never cared what a derby match looked like if the result is positive. Entertainment can come watching other teams!

Of course, Sam won't actually win me over until he shows that he can train the team on to the point where the potential of the youngsters is fully materialised and they can go to places like Anfield and play proper football with confidence. That won't take less than 2 years. For me, the jury will be out for a long time, even if things go relatively well for much of it.

Not that the entertainment was that much higher at Old Trafford, where Mourinho's pragmatism limited City's sparkle but didn't prevent them getting the result. For me two things were evident from the match. Ederson's excellent double save from Lukaku, the first with his face, reinforced the point that Guardiola has successfully resolved his team's main weakness of last season. And, despite all the hype and Guardiola's own statements about the importance to him of his team always playing their passing game, City showed they also will be as pragmatic as they need to be to get the job done. That involved blatant time wasting towards the end of the match and, perhaps more surprisingly, silky skilled David Silva taking out a player more normally considered one of the league's narks, Ander Herrera, in midfield in the closing period. Herrera isn't just a nark but towers over Silva. When the ref played an advantage United didn't want, Silva's next action was to to attempt to kneecap the even taller Matic only seconds later. The ref booked Silva when play eventually stopped, presumably for the first challenge, though both merited a yellow card. What was more than clear is that Guardiola's much vaunted 'when we lose the ball, try to win it back within 6 seconds' does indeed have a caveat, as Mourinho has been saying. That caveat is, of course, 'if you can't, halt play with a professional foul if the situation looks dangerous'. I'm not coming over all purist here, that's what most teams would do if they were quick enough. It's just the hypocrisy of commentators who think City don't do this stuff that gets me. And the fact that, whoever the best teams currently are, they seem to get cut more slack by referees.

But the obvious truth that City will do the dirty work when necessary means that, barring an amazing collapse, this season's title race is now a formality.



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