Diabolical refereeing, a sky four club getting ridiculous decisions and, to add to those re-occurring events, yet another lackluster performance, saw Everton leave Manchester with nothing on Saturday evening
Man City 1 Everton 0: Blues Go Down To Twelve Man Billionaires
By @Markthablue
Referee Andre Marriner had an horrendous day here, no question. His decisions were an unwelcome flashback to the days of Clattenburg, Collina and Clive Thomas all rolled into one amidst another day of utter frustration for Evertonians.
With one paced attacking – the equivalent of a TV guide – teams can see weeks in advance what we are going to do – and no plan B, it is becoming increasingly easy to play against us. With Europa action now ceasing for a couple of months, it is hoped we can now see the real Everton opposed to this lethargic, cautious, frankly dull blues side.
The match started off promisingly. I never like to cheer an opponent going off injured but when that player is Sergio Aguero, there was a moment of happiness and hope that we could take advantage and get our season moving in the right direction again.
Aguero looked in agony but it couldn’t have been as painful as watching our corners. I think we are comfortably the worst side in the league at corner kicks.
Back in the day with Andy Hinchcliffe and Big Duncan, our corners were as good as a penalty at times. The crowd used to be expectant to say the least. Now we just find them an irritant as we either get countered or hit the first man, or both. It is truly pathetic, but just one tiny aspect amongst a plethora that is adding up to a deeply frustrating start to the season
Jose Pozo came on, cue a Harry Hill style glance to the left. I’d never heard of this guy, surely now we had a great chance of victory. It seemed all our luck went off with a tearful Aguero and there was, quite simply, no chance we were getting anything at the Etihad with Marriner in charge.
Admittedly this implies we were playing well. Sadly nothing was further from the truth. This was a showing lacking in both conviction and belief, and as Blackadder would have it, an attacking performance that resembled an asthmatic ant with some heavy shopping.
Points wise, performance wise and innovation wise, this Everton side has a heavy workload on if it is to surpass the 5th placed finish of last season. We look unrecognisable.
The game quickly entered into a reenactment of Enter the Dragon with Andre Marriner all too happy to be lenient with the players in light blue.
Despite a City team that has had untold millions spent on it to get where they are today, this weak, pathetic excuse for a referee still felt the need to help them out. Theofficial was simply an embarrassment here.
After a booking for Mangala was deemed suitable punishment for karate kicking Eto’o in the back, Marriner out-done himself by only reaching for a yellow when Fernando attempted to decapitate Barry. Unfortunately this was the tip of the iceberg.
To add to the injustice, Marriner, hell-bent on helping Man City out, gave a penalty to the home side as Milner and Jags, seemingly in a three-legged race, stood shoulder to shoulder as nothing more than a coming together saw the City midfielder lose his balance. To Everton’s total amazement, the referee pointed to the spot. A utterly jaw dropping decision. Toureduly converted with conviction to put City ahead.
The exasperation and sense of injustice was fanned by our own inability to make an impression on the match. We lacked courage and quality and Lukaku is getting nothing in the way of service. Our midfield is badly letting him down for me and the chronic lack of pace in the team needs to be addressed in January. Along with the goalkeeper and centre back positions.
The half was played out with the blues defending with determination but making zero impression at the other end. Not one shot on target in the whole of the first half is not good enough.
None of us have the benefit of seeing into the future but right now at this moment, this Everton side is falling way below expectations. We look a million miles away from last year and I’m not sure what, but something is missing from this Everton.
The second half started with Man City in the ascendancy and attacking with purpose. Something we used to do if memory serves me right. Milner broke down the left and it has to be said, he done fantastically to pull the ball back to Pozo who must have thought he’d made it 2-0 but was denied by a superb Howard save to keep the blues in it. Great football all round.
Gareth Barry was booked soon after for a foul on Milner – this time justifiably going down – and giving Barry the night off when the blues entertain QPR at Goodison in a weeks time with his fifth booking of the season.
Barry had a dreadful game to be honest. Suicidal passing and a world record attempt to set up as many opposition attacks against us as possible highlighted how he sorely misses James McCarthy, but he also looks a few yards off the pace this season.
I don’t want to make this sound like a witch-hunt but Barry seems to have aged dramatically overnight and watching him here had the same effect on Evertonians. His three-year deal, still yet to dry on his contract, is starting to look more like a prison sentence than a fact to be joyful about.
I hope Barry turns it round because by and large he has been excellent for us and I’ve enjoyed watching him since he arrived but like the team, things desperately need to improve.
Amazingly and this is an area that is starting to grate amongst Evertonians, Martinez opted to take off the more impressive Besic than a clearly struggling Barry for Ross Barkley.
Martinez penchant for keeping players on who are out of form in the match is irritating at best, and stinks of senior players haveing more pull than they ought to when it comes to influencing Martinez decisions.
Ross Barkley came on and instantly we looked more of a threat going forward as bursting forward past Toure with purpose, Barkley fed Mirallas who in turn was frustrated to see Fernando block his goal bound effort. Something he wouldn’t have been able to do had Marriner done his job properly earlier in the first half.
Without playing well we were starting to make an impression going forward and Milner got in the way of Eto’o’s effort to deflect his shot wide. The golden chance, something that should have come a lot sooner arrived with under ten minutes remaining.
Lukaku, who for me was criminally starved of decent service, showed how much of a threat he can be when provided for. His well struck shot was tipped around the corner from Hart to give the cameraman a dive to capture and blues that empty feeling yet again this season.
This was yet another miserable weekend for the blues and the combined anger of an absolutely shocking refereeing display from Marriner, which surely warrants an FA investigation ,and the fact that yet again we looked like we were wading through treacle, leaves the blues perplexed as to what is in store this season.
With a team as bipolar as ours, it is so hard to keep a balanced view but I have full faith we will turn it around. The signs are not there currently but they will change. We’re not as fearless as last season, pedestrian attacking is not working and no plan B is absolutely affecting us. Especially with tactics as transparent as ours.
Clubs are playing us with the answers sat in front of them and we need to be more imaginative and Roberto’s innovation, so rightly applauded last season, needs to make an appearance this time out. Fearless, so often the by word last season, has now been replaced by fear and we need a return to our mentality last season.
Onto Krasnodor and an opportunity for some fringe players to stake a claim for the QPR game at Goodison Park. Our Europa tie is a dead rubber in qualification terms but the recent run of results has added greater significance to the tie for me. It represents a genuine chance for the likes of Oviedo, Joel, Browning, McAleny and Kone, amongst others, to impress the manager.
With a reserve team likely to face Krasnodor it gives this team eight days together to get fresh, focussed and fit for the must win QPR game. I hate saying must win and I feel it’s all I’ve been saying for large parts of the season but we have to get our season back on track. We can’t have Everton ruining Christmas with one depressing result after another.
“It’s not a penalty in a million years. Jagielka cannot disappear. It’s a natural action to get to the ball, putting aside the referee’s performance, our first-half performance on the ball was not as good as it could be.” Roberto Martinez.
A paltry 18 points from 15 games is not as good as it could be Roberto, the biggest gift of all this Christmas would be a reunion with last seasons fearless Everton.
Sin Miedo
Mark Ellis