Howard: We don’t focus on Spurs strengths
Tim Howard has been speaking about the positive outlook of Everton manager Roberto Martinez this week and says that his team look to focus on their strengths, rather than the opposition strengths.
Howard says that the team now focus on how they can cause damage to the opposition weaknesses and says that the team enjoy training like that rather than focus on what’s looming ahead.
‘We work on ourselves and that is a difference,’ said Howard, who has been one of Everton’s most consistent performer this season. ‘He will have some specific areas in which he thinks Tottenham are weak or Crystal Palace are weak and we will train on trying to exploit them.
‘That is what our training sessions will be about as opposed to, “here is what they are going to do to hurt us” and “this is what we are going to do to defend against them”. That is not in the manager’s nature. The way his mind works, he always sees holes in the other team the way he operates.
‘He doesn’t see the danger he sees the weakness and he always gets us working on that. Preparations during the week, no matter what game you go into, the focus has not at any point in time this season been on the other team.
‘On Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday or Friday, it has always been about us. When you are professional and you have to do this 40 weeks out of the year it is nice thing to not have to come into work every day thinking, “Oh, that’s looming ahead.”‘
‘You’re always a bit cagey. The staff he brought in have been brilliant but any time you have a lot of alpha males together, like in the world of sport, it’s just natural to put your guard up. There’s a bit of bravado that football players have as well.
‘We are all insecure, you want your position, you want to be at a club that wins, so it’s a very difficult one. There’s a bit of a feeling out process, like two animals in the wild figuring out what’s going on. But it quickly clicked here.’
Howard feels the club do need to deliver some silverware this season and says that the methods of Roberto Martinez and former manager David Moyes should be praised.
‘I would 100per cent agree with that,’ said Howard. ‘We have to give as much respect as we can to David Moyes. We have been in good situations before and I take the point it is a different way of getting to the same place and that is what brings so much pressure on now. Every result matters.’
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I listen carefully when Tim speaks.He knows the game inside out and obviously puts an effort into all his preparation,including the intellectual side of his chosen profession. When time has given a balm to the feeling of let down in the manner of his leaving and subsequent transfer shenanigans,I think most fans will see that David Moyes did far more good than harm in his tenure.He halted a slide which had us heading Championshipward. He gave us pride and belief where we were starting to adopt the philosophy of perennial strugglers. I think Roberto will now take us on to that next level,hopefully seamlessly,of realistic challenge for the top sports and trophies annually. But, his tenure can only be assessed on a much smaller number of matches and of a largely inherited squad,so far. A few years down the line when the ageing squad has been replaced by players of similar quality and we are still playing attractive and winning football,will be the time to laud him as saviour.