It's as traumatic as ever being an Evertononian at the moment. I think they said on Match of the Day that their opening two defeats in the Premier League by 7 goals to nil in total is the worst start the club has ever made to a season, though I can't confirm if that's just for the Premier League era given football doesn't appear to have existed before 1992. It also opened us up to those James Bond jokes (0 points, 0 goals, 7 conceded). Still, plenty of time, no need to panic. Doncaster beaten in the Haribo Cup, 2-0 up against Bournemouth after 86 mins, the sun is shining. And then - WTF???
While feeling utterly despondent about that collapse - no team has previously lost a Premier League game from 2-0 up after 86 minutes - I'm trying to be encouraged by the fact that Everton had dominated the game, were by far the better team (said Bournemouth manager Iraola) and had shown some skill as well as looking lively.
Meanwhile the new manager of another club that has appeared to be in chaos - Chelsea's Enzo Maresco - might just be wringing some order out of the madness. His team's day got off to a ropey start last weekend when winger Noni Madueke got his copy/paste/tab/send fingers all tangled. He posted a message, presumably meant to be sent privately to a friend, to the world on Instagram to the effect that "everything about this place" (i.e. Wolverhampton) "is shit". Oops.
He got roundly booed every time he touched the ball, though once he'd scored a hat trick in Chelsea's 6-2 away win it kind of lost any effect.
Wolves manager Gary O'Neill seemed to place the finger of blame rather directly when he said after the game "at no point in pre-season have we ever worked on not having a left back in place". You could understand his frustration as Madueke's 14 minute hat trick took the score from 2-2 to 2-5, with all the goals coming from Madueke's station on the right.
The left back was indeed AWOL for the second and third of Madueke's trilogy after transitions (or turnovers in rugby and American Football parlance) and the opportunities were beautifully made by Cole Palmer. Palmer repeatedly created overloads by staying relatively wide to the right of midfield when the ball was on Chelsea's left, rather against the current trend to compress the play laterally as well as vertically, so even when the left back was on station for the first of the hat trick it didn't matter. Though said full back didn't help himself trying to make the block by running with his arms behind him in the artificial way that has always irritated me and has now been declared un-necessary by the PGMOL. The Wolves player obviously didn't get that message either.
I'd already spotted Palmer's positioning during the highlights but it was also pointed out by analysts Troy Deeney and Fara Williams. Palmer set up Madueke for all three of his goals with 2 on 1s timing his pass perfectly on each occasion. He also scored Chelsea's second with a beautiful finish after finding himelf in acres of space, as he did all game. So that's no coincidence, he's got that knack. Unless O'Neill's midfield were all deserting their stations.
Chelsea looked bright and their readiness to stand up for each other in a feisty game hinted that they may have found some togetherness, despite the ridiculously large squad the Chelsea buying spree has given manager Maresco. Chelsea have bought 39 players in the last five transfer windows since their change of ownership. It has taken Man City 8 years and Liverpool 10 to buy as many players as Chelsea have in two. Maresco has exiled a significant number of the squad, including the first Chelsea signing during that amazing spree, Raheem Sterling, who has now gone on loan to Arsenal and could be a very useful asset for them. The manager said he didn't fancy Sterling's style of winger. I suspect it's more that his face doesn't fit as the stats bods say Mazueke and latest acquisition Felix are as close to identical in style to Sterling as you could get.
Except Madueke is that rare breed among highly paid footballers who spend their whole lives just playing football - he can actually use both feet quite well. "Inverted" wingers (left footers on the right and vice versa) seem to be thought of as something new but it's only the term that's relatively new. In the early 1990s Howard Kendall frequently played his wingers on the "wrong side" as the crowd would have it. He often played the very left footed Preki on the right. I was at one game where Preki, always cutting inside as his right really was for standing on, drove the crowd crazy. Until he cut in and scored.
Indeed, most inverted wingers remain very weak on the "wrong" foot. Which frustrates me as I made the most of being picked for my grammar school team on the left wing in the late 60s by working on using my left foot until it I was reasonably proficient with it. (The team captain was picked in my then preferred right wing position). So I was able to cut in and shoot with the right, but only when it looked the better option, not because I had to. Then when I went off to university I played on the left by choice. Of course I was far from the first 'inverted winger', probably by many decades.
The benefit of being relatively two-footed was that Madueke had his man terrified because he could go past on both sides and shoot when he'd done so. Not so much an inverted winger, maybe just a very good player.
We'll see how Chelsea go against better teams - they only managed a 1-1 home draw with Palace today - and whether they really are just Cole Palmer plus 10 others.
Though I still think they've gamed the PSR system with their huge squad (albeit apparently at lower average wage according to Jonathan Northcroft), extremely long contracts and sale of the hotel owned by the football club to the owners, a ruse Derby County used in their eventually vain attempt to avoid EFL financial sanctions a few years ago.
Everton have some cause for optimism. At the moment it looks like they had a good summer transfer window, though time will tell.Tim Iroegbunam (I'll just call him Tim) has looked impressive in midfield despite his inexperience and the suspicion that he was "traded" for Lewis Dobbin mainly to avoid further PSR sanctions. (The deals between Villa and Everton were officially not linked, they just happened to be a day apart for almost the same value). Iliman Ndiaye (not terribly sure how to say that name either) looked lively and was man of the match against Bournemouth. Everton kept hold of both Jarrad Branthwaite and Dominic Calvert-Lewin. They also signed two more players right on the deadline, defensive midfielder Orel Mangala from Lyon and striker Armando Broja from Chelsea, both of whom have Premier League experience. Broja has a foot injury and may not be available before mid October, though Everton aren't paying his wages until he is fit. He also missed a lot of the 22/23 season with an ACL rupture. But he's only 22 and I guess the logic is to get him fit and firing, in which case Everton's gamble in keeping Calvert-Lewin into the last year of his contract would at least have his possible departure covered, with a fee fixed for Broja at £30M if Everton decided to make his loan permanent. Though the definitive player stats website transfermarkt.com only values him at €22m.
All of this leaves the squad looking a bit less thin than in recent seasons, apart from the full-back positions. There they have Vitalii Mykolenko (Mikey to me), Seamus Coleman, Ashley Young, Nathan Patterson and 19 year old Roman Dixon*, with one first team game under his belt. As Sean Dyche clearly doesn't trust Patterson, rarely selecting him if anyone else is available - and he is currently injured anyway - this leaves the team exposed to the vagaries of injury, red cards and loss of form - all already encountered this season in this group - and fatigue given Coleman and Young have a combined age of 74 and a lot of miles on their clocks. It would be a bonus if Dixon proves good enough as he is that increasingly rare sight, a player who has been at the club since the age of 12.
So there are some grounds for hope, but it's nervous times to be a blue if it's Everton, while the jury's out on Chelsea.
Jonathan Northcroft's column Fit for baseball - but is Chelsea's transfer policy fit for football? in the Sunday Times on 25 Aug 2024 examined Chelsea's buying policy and featured the remarkable statistics quoted above.
* at least I can pronounce Roman Dixon's name, even if it reminds me of the one-liner "who gives kids a bad name?" Answer - Posh and Becks
"I Got The Blues" is a track on the Rolling Stones album Sticky Fingers
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