Twenty fucking shots.

Twenty.

You know how I know this? Not because I looked at the official stats or anything. No, I counted all these shots because what else was I going to do during this soul-crushing exercise in finishing futility?

Was I going to watch Jack Grealish create his fifth chance of the match, knowing – knowing – that we'd1 find a way to waste it?

Did I want to watch Beto sky another one into Row Z?

Or watch us win our tenth corner and accomplish precisely fuck-all with it?

This morning was filled with so much hope. So much potential.. There was genuine supporter excitement going into today, and it was justified. Everton hadn’t beaten Aston Villa in a Premier League match since Villa returned to the top flight in 2019.

Over the previous three or four seasons, this match would’ve been written off by the supporters before the match even began.

But after enduring a terrible summer transfer window due to the potential looming scythe of PSR, Unai Emery’s barely-improved squad started this season in shockingly poor form.

Everton were on the opposite end of things.

I was so excited for today’s match. I even laid out my Everton outfit last night, so as to not wake the wife this morning whilst trying to get dressed in the dark.

I went to bed excited. I woke up excited.

When the club announced the lineup for today, I couldn’t help but shake my head and marvel at our bench.

Our bench.

This is not a joke: last season, when the club announced the lineups on match days, I avoided looking at the bench altogether. I pretended it did not exist2, mostly because it really didn’t.

Today? I stared at that bench for a good, long time, imagining the possibilities and the options David Moyes had available to him.

We weren’t going to lose to Aston Villa. Not today, Satan. I predicted a 2-1 final, with Everton scoring twice in the first half and then, in traditional Everton fashion, holding onto their butts in the second half, trying to prevent the Villains from scoring three times.

We didn’t lose. But we didn’t win, either, and we really should have..

Here are my three takeaways from Saturday.

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Three Takeaways: How to Waste 2.12 xG and Your Saturday Afternoon

Twenty Shots and a Striker Who Can’t Finish

Here's the thing that's driving me absolutely crazy: we played well.

Twenty shots.

2.12 xG.

Ten corners.

Complete control of the match.

Grealish was cooking – five chances created, giving Matty Cash nightmares that'll last until Christmas. James Garner, playing out of position at left back, absolutely frustrated Villa's right side while still managing to link up beautifully going forward.

The back line? Magnificent. Villa managed just 0.3 xG. That's not a typo. Zero Point Three. Tarkowski and Keane turned Watkins into a ghost. O'Brien's long throws were causing chaos.

But – and there's always a fucking but with Everton – we put TWO of those twenty shots on target. TWO. It's like building a Ferrari and forgetting to put in the engine.

All that beautiful buildup play, all that pressure, and Beto is shooting like it’s his first day learning how to kick the ball.

Beto has proven during his time with the club that he simply cannot be relied on to convert shots that even strikers in the fifth tier of English football convert on a regular basis. It’s maddening. For all his promise and his immense physical prowess, he’s unable to execute the simple stuff. This is nothing new, either; it’s been that way from the start.

Next week, it’s time to put Thierno Barry in the starting lineup and keep him there.

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The Grealish Renaissance (And Why It's Not Enough Yet)

Playing against the club where he launched to stardom, Jack Grealish continued showing he is the player we thought we were getting.

He's finding pockets of space, linking with Garner and KDH, and by the 70th minute Villa were literally triple-teaming him because they had no other answer for him. That volley in the first half? The little dink to set up Beto? The man was channeling his best days, just in royal blue instead of claret.

The problem is we're asking him to be the entire creative department while Beto's first touch sends balls into orbit. It's criminal that this version of Grealish – confident, aggressive, taking players on – is reliant on a forward who can’t finish the dinners Grealish is serving him.

Still, if Grealish keeps this up and we can find someone, anyone, who remembers what the goal looks like, we are going to be a dangerous, dangerous team to contend with.

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Moyes Ball 2.0: The Good, The Bad, The Familiar

David Moyes has us organized, pressing high, and creating chances. The shape is good, the effort is there, and for the first time in months, we actually look like we have a plan beyond "hope Pickford saves us." The crowd was electric, the team responded, and we dominated a Premier League match from start to finish.

But here's where the Everton PTSD kicks in: this felt exactly like vintage Moyes. Lots of possession, plenty of half-chances, crosses flying in from everywhere, and absolutely zero cutting edge when it matters. It's like watching a band perfectly play all the notes but somehow miss the melody.

The encouraging part? Villa came to frustrate us and we didn't let them. We kept pushing, kept creating, kept the crowd engaged. The concerning part? This is exactly the kind of match – against a team that can't score, at home, with everything in our favor – that teams who want to finish high on the table must win. And we didn’t.

Still, I'd rather watch us create twenty chances and waste them than watch us create nothing at all. That's progress, I guess. The bar has been so low, for so very long, and we’ve spent years just hoping we’d avoid running into it with our faces. Today, we’re not only clearing the bar; we’re raising it, substantially.

Today’s result was frustrating, but for entirely different reasons than the ones we’ve experienced for so long.

We should have won, and we didn’t.

But I’ll take that sort of frustration over the hopeless despair of the past four or five years any day of the week.

Everton Contract Extensions Feel Like a New Dawn

For years, Everton lived as a holding club.

We developed talent. We showcased them. Supporters fell in love. And then a bigger name came waving a check, and the cycle reset: the player leaves, Everton pockets the money, the rebuild begins. Predictable. Painful.

That’s why The Friedkin Group’s decision to extend Jarrad Branthwaite’s contract in July was seismic. Branthwaite wasn’t just another prospect—he was coveted by Manchester United and Real Madrid, and Everton’s finances made his departure feel inevitable. Instead, he signed on again.

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The extension sent two clear signals:

• Everton intend to build around their best players, not sell them.

• Transfer gossip no longer dictates the club’s direction.

And now comes the news that Jordan Pickford—already contracted until 2027—is negotiating a new deal that could keep him at Goodison for the rest of his career.

Pickford is more than England’s No. 1. More than one of the best keepers in the world. He’s been Everton’s constant through relegation scraps, chaos, and endless resets. Extending him early isn’t about urgency. It’s about intent. It’s a line in the sand against the old way of doing business.

None of this guarantees success. Pickford is one player, one contract. But alongside Branthwaite’s renewal, it marks a shift: TFG’s Everton is not the same Everton.

This is the change supporters have been waiting for.

Well, one of many.

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Soucek on Everton Switch: “I Said No”

Late in the summer window, it seemed certain Everton would reunite David Moyes with his old West Ham midfielder Tomas Soucek.

Plenty of supporters weren’t sold. But Moyes knows Soucek. He knows what he can do, and they’ve built a trust that goes beyond tactics.

So it was a surprise when the window closed and Soucek was still a West Ham player. According to the man himself, that’s because he turned Everton down. Speaking to Czech outlet Ceske Noviny:

“There was interest. It was also in the media, it was also felt at the club. But West Ham and I said no, because I feel the strength of West Ham and I feel a stable position there that is recognized. So I look forward to further cooperation at West Ham.”

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Everton vs. Aston Villa Preview

Everton’s season started the same way too many have: with disappointment. Leeds away, 1–0, a soft penalty given, the points gone. Same old Everton. New stadium or not.

And then something shifted. Back home at Hill Dickinson, under that new-car-smell glow only a new ground provides, Everton finally remembered how to win. Iliman Ndiaye etched himself into trivia forever with the first goal scored there (after scoring the final goal at Goodison to cap off last season’s incredible turnaround engineered by Moyes). James Garner added the second. Jack Grealish had his fingerprints on both, and suddenly the mood tilted. A follow-up win steadied the ship further. Moyes-ball wasn’t sexy—it never is—but it worked.

Villa arrive in a funk. Three games, no goals, and the look of a side already under strain. Unai Emery’s men are brittle, stretched thin by a summer financial straightjacket.

The bookmakers call it nearly even. Everton are narrow favorites, but Villa remain too talented to dismiss. The reality, though, feels different. Everton are humming. Grealish is conducting the orchestra again after being resigned to playing the wood block for City. Hill Dickinson will be loud, probably hostile, and momentum is suddenly on Everton’s side.

A year ago this would have been farce, a side with no attack trying to scrape enough together to garner one point. Now? Everton can hurt you. And if the match turns into a slog, they can grind too.

Prediction: Everton 2–1

Hello, friends and fellow Evertonians. I hope your Thursday morning is bright, cheerful, and filled with hope for the day ahead.

I’m working on a feature story about the various ways people become fans of Everton. I’m utterly fascinated by the way people become fans of particular football clubs, and I would love to hear your story.

• Is it a generational fandom that has been passed down through your family?

• Did you stumble across them one day on TV?

• Did you see Jack Grealish’s calves and find yourself instantly smitten? 1

How did you become a fan? And perhaps more importantly, why did you become a fan? Why Everton?

Click the button below to share your story:

Comment

You can also email me (myevertonstory@readthetower.com) if you wish. If you prefer not to use your real name, please let me know, and I’ll ensure your privacy.

Tell Your Friends

Do you have an Everton-supporting friend (or friends)? Please send them this note so they can share their own origin story. ⤵️

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FOOTNOTES

EVERTON HAD A WHIRLWIND weekend. They beat Wolves Saturday, 3-2, in a match that was an absolute joy to watch. Until the end.

Look. We are Everton, okay?

That means a lot of things. It means an incredible and passionate fanbase. It means a club with a long history that’s virtually unmatched by any club in the world, not just England. It meant Goodison Park, an intimidating (and perhaps unsafe?) ground that shook when Evertonians erupted in cheers. Now, Everton means a modern, gleaming stadium that was literally1 designed to be loud.2

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Everton rarely makes anything easy. It’s our trademark. Everton leading 4-0 with 20 minutes remaining in a match? We Toffees are still fully clenched.3 It’s in our nature to be concerned about good things and good times.

But it genuinely appears to be a beautiful new dawn for the club. I’m going to do my best to enjoy it without waiting for the other shoe to fall and hit me in the groin.

Everton’s 2025 Summer Window: Positives and Negatives

I’VE COVERED THE SUMMER WINDOW A LOT during the short history of this publication. In my defense, it’s the biggest story in world football at the moment.

But I want to touch on a few more things before tying a bow on this window and focusing on what’s happening now and what’s coming down the road.

➕ Positives

• This was a sea change summer for Everton. With so many contracts expiring, the club’s new recruitment department—which includes David Moyes, who has an outsized say in final player decisions—essentially had to remake the squad from the ground up. Moyes let some go: DCL and Abdoulaye Doucouré4 being the most notable.

• We were told it would take more than a single window to remake the squad to Moyes’ satisfaction. It will. However, Everton crossed several items off their summer task list, notably creating a dangerous, fluid attacking front that is quite enjoyable to watch.

• Everton spent a potential of £150m this summer, if all clauses are triggered.5

• It was kept secret at the time, but Inter (the Milan one, not the Miami one with Leo Messi and the squad full of a-holes) made a £40m bid for Iliman Ndiaye. I don’t know if the Everton front office had a hearty laugh before politely telling Milan no; if not, they should have.

• The deadline day signing of Merlin Röhl seemingly came out of nowhere. His name hadn’t been recently linked to the club or mentioned as a possible incoming player. But a club source told me on Monday that the club’s scouting and development team had briefly looked at Röhl earlier in the window. His name re-emerged as a possible alternative to Tomas Soucek after West Ham turned back Everton’s inquiries. Röhl doesn’t play quite as deep as Soucek—he’s more of a #8 than a defensive mid—so it’ll be interesting to see how Moyes utilizes him during the loan period. 6

• We’ve already discussed the impact of Jack Grealish on the team, but any list of window positives has to include Super Jack.

• With Grealish, Dewsbury-Hall, and Ndiaye, Everton’s attack is unlike anything we’ve seen from an Everton squad in a long time. And it’s not just the attack; it’s the buildup and the passing and everything else leading up to the attack that impresses.

• Harrison Armstrong’s loan move to Preston North End7 is a positive and a negative. Armstrong is clearly a future superstar for Everton, and he already warrants a place in the Toffees’ match-day squad. But Armstrong needs to be starting at least 30 matches this season and average 75 minutes per game, at minimum, to continue his development. He’s not just one for the future, as pundits like to call great prospects. Armstrong is the one for the future.

• And finally, Grealish’s calves. I mean, have you seen these things? When even are they?

  

➖ Negatives

• We all hoped Everton would land a right-back before the deadline; at least one David Moyes trusts enough to start and give a proper run of minutes. Jake O’Brien has filled in admirably since being asked to cover the role, but he’s a center-back by trade.
  
  The longer he plays out of position, the more his limitations become apparent. So it felt like right-back was a position Everton desperately needed to fill. But the club feels differently, at least regarding urgency.
  
  No right-back signings were made, which leaves O’Brien, the aging Seamus Coleman, and Nathan Patterson8 to handle duties there. James Garner, who seemingly can play anywhere on the pitch (and often has), played the position regularly in his youth days.
  
  Regardless, O’Brien needs to be back at his natural position, preparing himself to help Branthwaite anchor our back line for a decade. Patterson showed a ton of promise when he arrived at the club, but has yet to show any indication he’s anywhere close to reaching that potential. It’s likely he’ll get his chance to earn the spot; Patterson has to capitalize on the opportunity.

• The departure of Youssef Chermiti is a disappointment, to be sure. We lost money on him. But the worst part is that we never really got to see him reach the potential we all saw in him when he first arrived. Chermiti now reunites with Kevin Thelwell, the former Everton director of football operations who now serves as Rangers’ sporting director.

Next Up: Aston Villa

Everton welcome Aston Villa on September 13 after the international break.

• Villa signed seven players during the window. The biggest (in name value, at least) by far was Jadon Sancho, who moved on deadline day from hapless Manchester United.

  • Sancho arrived at Old Trafford from Borussia Dortmund in 2021 for £73m. He immediately developed a contentious relationship with then-manager Erik Ten Hag until Ten Hag sent Sancho to United’s Isle of Expensive Misfit Toys.

  • At Villa, though, Sancho offers something they’ve badly lacked: a wide player who can carry the ball through pressure, commit defenders, and still pick out the right final ball. Unai Emery’s system thrives on players who can flip the field in an instant, and Sancho’s ability to create one-on-one chaos could be the difference between Villa grinding out results and actually blowing teams away.

• Harvey Elliott (loan from Liverpool, with a ~£35 m obligation to buy) brings an elusive creative spark to the spine of the team. He’s capable of defense-splitting passes and movement off the ball that pair well with Watkins and Tielemans.

• Villa also signed Victor Lindelof—another potential target the Toffees had under consideration—on a free. Lindelof adds genuine Premier League experience to a backline that’s occasionally looked shaky. Former teammates say Lindelof’s calming presence under pressure was crucial to their match-day mindset.

• Evann Guessand arrived from Nice for about £26m. I haven’t had much time to look into him deeply, but he’s a true center forward with a big presence; he should complement starter Ollie Watkins nicely.

➡️ We’ll get into a deeper look at how Villa might set up and play against Everton in our match preview next week.

📝

Footnotes

Editor’s Note: I intended to publish this Sunday night, but an illness forced me to delay it. You can join our subscriber chat (it’s free) to discuss Deadline Day and anything else Everton-related you wish to talk about.

🙋‍♂️ If you have a free moment, would you consider taking our 2025 Reader Survey? It’ll help our editorial team a great deal when we decide what to cover for you.

BY EVERTON STANDARDS, IT HAS been a spectacular transfer season.

The past few years made supporters feel like the guy standing outside the electronics shop, looking longingly through the window at the new television they want but know they cannot afford.

Seasons of forced austerity, brought on by the free-wheeling, thoughtless spending of the Farhad Moshiri regime, forced us to suffer on the sidelines, watching as every other club in the Premier League conducted its business.

The difference between then and now is stark. It hasn’t even been a full year since the Houston, Texas-based Friedkin Group completed its takeover of the club. Debts are paid. Our new stadium is complete, stunning, and is instantly the loudest stadium in the league, if not the world, allaying fears that the Dan Meis-designed wonder would lack the soul and intimidation of the Grand Old Lady.

We supporters were nervous going into the summer. We aren’t used to spending money during transfer windows anymore. It feels foreign. But with many player contracts expiring—and with the returning David Moyes needing a chance to start crafting a squad of his own—we approached the window with hope and hesitation.

We did more than I expected, by a wide margin.

• Jack Grealish: Super Jack’s Everton career is off to a dream start, for fans and for Grealish himself. Grealish has 4 assists in 2 games, which is more than he pulled together in his final two seasons at Manchester City combined..Broken free of the constraints Pep placed on him at City, Grealish is showing why the blue side of Manchester made him the British record buy when they paid Aston Villa £100M. Grealish is so happy to be playing for Everton that it’s visible on his face during matches. I don’t know when Everton can activate its £50m option to make the move permanent, but we should proceed with that. Now.

• Carlos Alcaraz: Alcaraz impressed enough last season on loan to make his move permanent. Thus far, he’s been something of a non-issue this season, but once he gels with the other attackers in the squad, I expect him to return to his dangerous ways.

• Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall: Chelsea supporters felt their club pulled the wool over £26.8m signing. The Chelsea supporters were wrong.

• Tyler Dibling: Everton’s had a right-wing issue for a couple of years; it was the most glaring need going into this summer. The club filled that hole by signing the 20-year-old Dibling, whose obvious nickname is “Dribbling” due to his skill…dribbling.

• Thierno Barry: Everton’s striker of the future, or perhaps even the present, if his performances so far are any indication.

• Adam Aznou: Our left-back of the future. Everton secured the 19-year-old Aznou from Bayern Munich, which is a club that knows a thing or two about developing players. So does Barcelona, which signed Aznou at 14, also does so.

• Mark Travers: Signed as a backup for Jordan Pickford, Travers replaced the talented Joao Virginia.

• Tom King: Everton’s “break in case of emergency” option at GK.

• Merlin Rohl: Everton’s deadline day signing is a defensive midfielder with the ability to play left-back.

Note: Any deals announced after the deadline are not included here, but will be added as they are confirmed by the club.

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✅ Incoming Transfers: What We Got

Everton’s attack has been completely remade—to a shocking extent. New additions Jack Grealish, Thierno Barry, and Keirnan Dewsberry-Hall have partnered with Iliman Ndiaye up front to form what appears to be one of the Premier League’s most exciting attacks, capable of creating magical moments of football fluidity and team goals.

Ndiaye was one of Everton’s two best players last season, alongside Jordan Pickford. This year, he’s receiving service he could only have dreamed of last year. The result is a player on the verge of genuine superstardom on the world stage.

INCOMING TRANSFERS

• Jack Grealish: Super Jack’s Everton career is off to a dream start, for fans and for Grealish himself. Grealish has 4 assists in 2 games, which is more than he pulled together in his final two seasons at Manchester City combined..Broken free of the constraints Pep placed on him at City, Grealish is showing why the blue side of Manchester made him the British record buy when they paid Aston Villa £100M. Grealish is so happy to be playing for Everton that it’s visible on his face during matches. I don’t know when Everton can activate its £50m option to make the move permanent, but we should proceed with that. Now.

• Carlos Alcaraz: Alcaraz impressed enough last season on loan to make his move permanent. Thus far, he’s been something of a non-issue this season, but once he gels with the other attackers in the squad, I expect him to return to his dangerous ways.

• Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall: Chelsea supporters felt their club pulled the wool over £26.8m signing. The Chelsea supporters were wrong.

• Tyler Dibling: Everton’s had a right-wing issue for a couple of years; it was the most glaring need going into this summer. The club filled that hole by signing the 20-year-old Dibling, whose obvious nickname is “Dribbling” due to his skill…dribbling.

• Thierno Barry: Everton’s striker of the future, or perhaps even the present, if his performances so far are any indication.

• Adam Aznou: Our left-back of the future. Everton secured the 19-year-old Aznou from Bayern Munich, which is a club that knows a thing or two about developing players. So does Barcelona, which signed Aznou at 14, also does so.

• Mark Travers: Signed as a backup for Jordan Pickford, Travers replaced the talented Joao Virginia.

• Tom King: Everton’s “break in case of emergency” option at GK.

Note: Any deals announced after the deadline are not included here, but will be added as they are confirmed by the club.

🎯 Everton Incoming Transfers: What We Still Need

To help me identify potential incoming signings for these positions, I decided to bring my friends at the Everton Aren’t We podcast. You should subscribe and listen today, if you aren’t already.

Below, we analyze each position Everton needs to shore up, and then I’ll give you Dave’s five players at each position that Everton could go after in January.

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Right-Back

Seamus Coleman has been one of the best, most inspirational Everton leaders of all time. He’s The Captain, and forever will be.

When you take into account how much he cost us at the time, I think he’s the best purchase ever made by a Premier League club. He’s capable of excellent performances—as seen against Mansfield Town in our Carabao Cup win. This is his 17th consecutive season for Everton—a club record that will likely never be broken1.

(And because I’m me, I went ahead and compiled a list of the best value signings in the history of the Premier League, which you can find in the footnotes.2)

Nathan Patterson hasn’t lived up to all the potential we saw in him. Also, his body is such that if you touch him, he’s injured and out for 15 months. We need someone who can plug in, run the game, and not get dismantled by Premier League runners. No more patching with midfielders or praying Coleman stays healthy.

This is not a “nice to have” position. This is a must.

POTENTIAL WINTER WINDOW TARGETS: RIGHT-BACK

• Vanderson from Monaco

• Maitland-Niles from Roma

• Juanlu Sanchez from Sevilla

• Franculino Djú from Midtjylland

• Kobe Corbanie from Royal Antwerp

• Joaquin Seys from Club Brugge

Central Midfield & Defensive Midfielder

Everton have creativity at the front—Ndiaye, Dewsbury-Hall, Alcaraz, James Garner. What they lack is any depth to that creativity, especially in midfield.

Harrison Armstrong is Everton’s best outfield prospect. He’s one of the best prospects the club has ever produced. He’s a special player with a bright future; he’s the kid you build a team around to accentuate his strengths.

While I’d love to have him with the Everton first team every single week, the smart thing is to send him to a Championship-level club where he starts every week and plays 75+ minutes each time. One more year of that, and Armstrong comes back as our midfield director.

The thought of Armstrong linking play with Grealish, KDH, and Ndiaye is positively salivating. 

With Armstrong leaving, you’re one hamstring injury away from chaos. We need a backup midfielder who can maintain shape, cover ground, and allow Moyes to shuffle pieces without looking panicked: a defensive option or a box-to-box mid who doesn’t break under pressure.

POTENTIAL WINTER WINDOW TARGETS: MIDFIELDERS

• Bernabé from Parma

• Tomáš Součekk from West Ham

• Elias Montiel from Pachuca

• Christos Mouzakitis from Olympiacos

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Striker

The departure of Youssef Chermiti to Rangers reunites him with former Everton Director of Football Kevin Thelwell.

Thelwell spent £12m on Chermiti for Everton in 2023; he leaves for Rangers for £8m, having never lived up to the promise Thelwell saw in him. Or rather, sees in him.

Chermiti’s departure leaves the Toffees with a need for depth up front. Barring the shocking arrival of a front-line world-class striker after the deadline passes—which I do not expect—Beto and Thierno Barry will fight for minutes at the position. Beto will likely get the bulk of the minutes at the beginning of the season, but I fully expect Barry to be our everyday striker by the end of the year, if not much earlier.

But the global striker market is highly competitive this summer. Liverpool and Arsenal have purchased all of the top-line strikers.3 Doesn’t matter if they need them. The result is a market where, if you want a striker—particularly a great one—you are going to pay out the crinkum-crankum4 for it.

POTENTIAL WINTER WINDOW TARGETS: STRIKER

• Evan Ferguson

• Jamie Vardy

• Hamzai Igamame

• Danny Ings

  

FOONOTES

THERE IS A NEW FEELING FOR EVERTON fans this year.

It’s called joy. And it feels pretty strange for us.

For the past four to five years, Everton supporters have started each season with a mixture of dread, hopelessness, and a hint of terror as to what awaited the club as it began a new campaign.

It wasn’t the hope that killed us. Former Everton owner Farhad Moshiri had well and truly killed the hope1. All the supporters could hope for was that we’d somehow, by hook or crook, avoid relegation for the first time since 1950-1951.

It was not a fun existence for anyone, but especially for the supporters. I’m sure it feels terrible to actually be on a team that’s relegated for the first time in 75 years. However, players and coaches are allowed to move on. There’s always another club looking for players or managers, even if they’re coming from a just-relegated team.

But there’s no moving on for supporters who are wedded to the club for life. If Everton went down, well, we went down with them. And so we lived on the margins of football fandom. It was a dark time.

But under David Moyes, sunny days are here again.

FOR THE FIRST TIME in a long time, Everton looks like a team with swagger. Not manufactured swagger, not PR-department swagger—the real thing.

A 3-2 win over Wolverhampton on Saturday pushed them up to fifth2 in the table, while Wolves stayed winless, still thrashing about like a fish on a pier.

It started with simplicity. Seven minutes in, Vitalii Mykolenko swung a ball into the box, Jack Grealish nodded it back across goal, and Beto did the rest. One-nil. This is what it looks like when a team has a plan and players actually follow it.

Wolves got their one moment of joy midway through the first half. A free kick came drifting in, Everton’s defense went wandering, and Hwang Hee-Chan slipped through to score. First goal of Wolves’ season, and it had all the energy of a hammered human at The Winslow looking to slam one last pint before heading across the street to Goodison.

The Everton response was immediate. Grealish was in the middle of it, again, with a clever flick to Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, who returned it for Iliman Ndiaye to finish. Two-one. It wasn’t just a goal, it was a statement:

Everton are not scared of these situations anymore.

The second half was more of the same. Grealish pulled the strings again, feeding Dewsbury-Hall, who lashed one high into the net. At three-one, the game was seemingly finished. Grealish continued pulling Everton into an identity they’ve lacked for years.

But Everton never makes it easy, do they? ]

With 11 minutes left, Mykolenko made a mess of a routine clearance, and Rodrigo Gomes punished him. Suddenly, Wolves believed, or at least gave the appearance they did.

They surged, they pressed, they launched everything they had. Jordan Pickford denied Bellegarde, Gomes nearly nicked a point, and the final whistle felt like a release valve.

⚽️ Everton 3. Wolves 2.

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✅ Takeaways

Grealish, Reborn

THE BIG HEADLINE IS OBVIOUS: Jack Grealish is back.

Two assists here bring the total to four in two matches to start the season, good enough for a Premier League lead that doubles the next few players on the list.

For context, Grealish has doubled his assist total from his two final seasons combined at Man City. He’s on pace to shatter his season assists record3; at his current pace, he’s on track to rack up 84 assists this season4.

He looks freer, sharper, and Moyes is giving him license to be himself, which is something Pep Guardiola took away from him over the last two years at City. Pep is a tactical innovator and a genius, but there’s no explanation for why he paid $100 million for a player and then took away the biggest weapon in his arsenal.

When Grealish came off late in the match, the away supporters sang his name. Loudly. Proudly.

It won’t be the last time. This isn’t just a redemption arc—it’s potentially career rehab in real time. Grealish’s touch, his awareness, the simple fact that he wants the ball again—it all screams of a player who has something to prove. If Jack keeps performing at this rate, he’ll easily break his single-season assists record. Hell, he’s almost halfway there.

Is it too soon to activate the option to make Jack’s move permanent? Let’s get that done and not wait until the end of the season.

Wolves: Hollow Fight

FOR WOLVERHAMPTON, THE MATH IS UGLY. Three league games, zero points. They’re already staring at a relegation scrap unless something drastic changes. Their attack still feels like wishful thinking, their defense collapses under any pressure, and manager Vítor Pereira already looks like a man aging in dog years.

The late surge was admirable, but it doesn’t keep you in the Premier League. Wolves need more than scraps of defiance. They need an actual plan. Having been in their shoes for years, I know what their supporters are feeling. All I can say to them is, don’t give up. Stay with your team. Support them. Sing for them. Chant their names.

They’re going to need you.

The Bigger Picture

EVERTON ARE BUILDING REAL MOMENTUM. Moyes has his squad bought in, and Grealish is the spark that lights the whole thing. A year ago, this club was on the way to what seemed like another relegation fight under Sean Dyche. By January, Dyche gave up on his players and left in a shocking act of cowardice.

Today? Everton looks dangerous. Probably not title contenders—let’s not get drunk on the moment—but it feels like we have an outside chance of pushing for a Europa League spot. Perhaps we’ll have a decent cup run? Truthfully, after what we’ve been through for the past few years, a nice, comfortable mid-table finish with zero stress or drama would feel mighty nice and appreciated this year.

That doesn’t mean I want the team to aim for mid-table, though. They need to take the pitch every week, fighting to win the league.

Wolves, meanwhile, are precisely what Everton used to be: anxious, brittle, hoping someone else will bail them out. Their season already feels like a long march.

The Final Word

Everton didn’t just win—they showed a version of themselves supporters can actually believe in. A version built on fight, identity, and an ex-City winger suddenly looking like himself again. For Wolves, it’s another empty night and another chorus of frustrated jeers.

Sometimes football is cruel. Sometimes it’s kind. Today? It was both. Everton smiled. Wolves sulked.

And the table—even in these early days—tells the story.

In a way, Everton’s 1-1 draw away to Brentford on Wednesday was slightly disappointing. It felt weird writing that sentence; there was a time, and by that mean a little more than a month ago, where an Everton draw away to Brentford—and the one point added to our Premier League total—would’ve given us reason to celebrate.

Now? Not so much.

Don’t get me wrong. A point is a point. But when the final whistle sounded, I was annoyed.

It was a match we could have and should have won.

What a difference a month can make.

And what a difference a manager can make.

Beto(hno)

In the six matches before Everton’s clash with Brentford, Beto finally smashed the goal-less curse that had dogged his Everton stint since that $27 million gamble from Udinese back in August 2023. Those six strikes—each one echoing with a Toffee’s roar of redemption—had us clutching hope, if not outright faith, that Beto might just be the lethal finisher Kevin Thelwell and the club’s recruitment wizards dreamed of when they signed him.

But Wednesday’s draw against Brentford left us scratching our heads, didn’t it? Beto missed three golden chances to bury Brentford’s Mark Flekken1—moments that flashed us back to the old Beto, the one Evertonians knew before January’s scoring spree, the guy who’d stumble at the final hurdle, ball at his feet, net in sight, despite ranking 7th in the Premier League for shots on target per match. It was familiar heartbreak all over again.

We’re desperate for a consistent finisher—Toffees have been starving for one since Romelu Lukaku last pulled on the blue jersey. We need someone who can:

1. Bang in goals, game after game, no questions asked.

2. Stay on the pitch, not the treatment table.

There’s no doubt Beto’s got it in him. I see these remaining games as his shot to prove to Moyes, Thelwell (or whoever’s calling the shots as director of football next), and the Friedkin Group that he’s the guy. If he nails it, our summer transfer window could look a whole lot different. A striker’s still on the shopping list—especially with DCL’s exit looking like a done deal2—but if Beto locks down the starting role, Everton won’t be chasing a new number nine; they’ll be hunting for backup. And backup, folks, comes a hell of a lot cheaper than a starter.

Thank God Beto’s not stuck under Sean Dyche anymore—that man’s stubbornness was a brick wall, refusing to tweak his tactics for the players or the results staring him in the face. I’ve never seen a football manager so rigid, not even Louis Van Gaal with his rigid formations—Dyche made him look flexible. But Beto’s thrived since Moyes stepped in, because Moyes does what most gaffers do: he molds the system around the striker’s strengths, not the other way around.

I reckon Brentford was a blip—a rare stumble for our man. Beto will likely get back to banging in goals, though it won’t be every match—that’s just not how these streaks roll. But the clock’s ticking, and Toffees everywhere are watching: can Beto deliver, or will we keep chasing that elusive finisher?

Jake O’Brien: Everton’s New Defensive Star

Jake O’Brien has emerged as the Toffee we didn’t see coming—a defensive rock playing out of position at right-back, yet somehow stealing the show. It’s the kind of Everton story that’s played out for over one hundred years.

O’Brien, the 23-year-old Irish colossus signed from Lyon for £17 million last summer, was meant to shore up the center of defense alongside Jarrad Branthwaite and James Tarkowski. But Dyche, in keeping with his stubborn nature, flat-out refused to give O’Brien much consideration, because he hadn’t approved his transfer.

And so, O’Brien sat. And sat.

But with a new manager and a dearth of options due to injuries—Nathan Patterson sidelined, Seamus Coleman hobbling, and Moyes scrambling for options—he’s been shoved out to right-back. It’s not his natural spot. But watching him, you’d never know.

Since Moyes took over, O’Brien’s delivered two clutch goals that’ve had us leaping off our seats. Clinical, aerial dominance in the box with precision headers. Two goals in seven games under Moyes, and both feeling like lifelines for a side scrapping for points in 15th place.

But it’s not just the goals—it’s the grit. O’Brien’s defensive stats are the stuff of Toffee dreams: 1.5 aerial duels won per match, 1.2 tackles, and 1.3 clearances, making him a brick wall out wide. Against Brentford, he shut down their left flank, even as they faded after halftime, racking up 4 interceptions and winning 3 out of his 4 duels. Sure, he doesn’t have Seamus Coleman’s pacey overlap. But his physicality and positioning have plugged a gap Moyes couldn’t afford to leave open.

Playing right-back isn’t easy for a center-back, but O’Brien’s adapted like he’s been there all his life. Moyes, always the tactician, has molded his system around O’Brien’s strengths: aerial power, ball-playing ability, and that relentless work rate. It’s a far cry from Dyche’s rigid setup, where players like O’Brien either got squeezed into square pegs or didn’t play at all due to the manager’s pettiness3. Moyes doesn’t make those mistakes, and O’Brien’s thriving because of it.

We’ve been desperate for Everton heroes for quite a few years now. We’ve had relegation nipping at our heels as we hoped we could do just enough to make it to Bramley-Moore as a Premier League side. There were times it didn’t feel possible. Right now? The thought of going down seems implausible. I haven’t felt optimism like this in at least half a decade.

O’Brien’s one of the major reasons we’re feeling this way. He’s becoming not just a crucial player for Everton; he’s becoming a heartbeat. And once a player becomes an Everton heartbeat, it’s a very short distance to Everton legend.

Brave, Brave Alcaraz

January signing Carlos Alcaraz started in place of Abdoulaye Doucouré. Alcaraz brought a level of intensity, resolve and athleticism that Doucouré just doesn’t have. But far more importantly, Alcaraz gave Everton a legitimately creative attacking threat the squad has been missing for quite some time.

I loved watching Alcaraz, way outside the box, spin with the ball and fire off two shots on goal. No hesitation. No fear. Cero miedo. Twice. No hesitation. No fear. Cero miedo. And while I’d also love to make a joke here about “zero accuracy” or “zero goals,” the truth is, he did come pretty close on both of those shots. That boldness? That’s what we’ve been missing. 4

I’m truly hoping that, come March 8, I will not find myself staring down at an Everton starting squad sheet with Doucouré’s written name on it. Everton managers seem to love the man and, truth be told, he’s put in plenty of respectable shifts for us. But he’s a liability in more ways than he isn’t, lumbering about while the game races around him5. We need to give Alcaraz—a player who wants to stay at Everton beyond his loan expiration—an extended starting lineup run so we can see if what he has to offer is worth turning into a permanent deal this summer.

I haven’t seen enough of him to truly make a judgment yet. But I will say this: We look far more threatening with Alcaraz in the lineup than we do with Doucouré trudging through his own midfield mud.

F O O T N O T E S

It was a beautiful, sunny day at Goodison Park. The home supporters were in full voice, riding a superb run of form that seemed impossible a little more than a month ago. The dread, the dreariness, the sadness are all gone, replaced by hope and a little bit of confidence.

There was a time we would’ve dreaded Manchester United coming to Goodison Park. Not today. Today, it was United—spiraling ever downward, new manager Rubin Amorim unable to stem the bleeding wound inflicted on the club by Erik Ten Hag—that dreaded what was to come. During the pre-match warmups, Everton legend Duncan Ferguson noted that he didn’t like what he was seeing from the United players’ body language.

Ferguson was right. This United seemed off. Very unlike United squads are supposed to look.

And Everton capitalized.

Beto can’t stop scoring

At 21 minutes in, after United had several chances to clear the ball and failed to do so, the ball fell neatly for Beto and, as he has done in his last five games, he sliced it into the net with power and precision. Goodison went wild. And then fell silent for three minutes as they waited for VAR to check and see if there was an offsides in there somewhere. There wasn’t, and it was clear from first watch that Beto was onside. But still, VAR.

That’s the worst thing about VAR, I think. Other than bad VAR decisions ruining games—and we’ll talk more about this in a second—the main thing it does is take the joy out of goal celebrations. Scoring a goal and celebrating is one of the coolest things about football. But these days, we celebrate for a few seconds, then wait and wait and wait while some official rewatches the play dozens of times in slow motion.

Even when the goals are confirmed, the moment is lost. That sheer rapture is reduced to mild relief.

And that sucks. For the players, and for the fans.

At 33 minutes, Abdoulaye Doucoure doubled Everton’s lead with a great poachers goal. All the rage I felt when I learned Doucs would be starting instead of Charly Alvarez—the man quickly becoming my other favorite current Everton player alongside Beto—dissipated.

Everton went into the half up 2-0, and I started writing this recap, confident this was going to be a dominant victory for the Toffees.

It was not.

Boy, that second half was terrible.

All the fire and creativity and verve Everton displayed in the first half was gone in the second. And boy, Amorim must’ve given one hell of a halftime speech, because the United team that took the field in the second half was not the same squad from the first half. They weren’t great, but they were enough to level an Everton squad that started to show some tired legs.

And yet, Everton still should’ve had the chance to win the match. And they didn’t get it because of a bullshit call.

Let’s Talk About That Horrible VAR Decision

Near the end of extra time, Matthijs De Ligt and Harry Maguire were penalized for fouling Ashley Young in the box. De Ligt pulled Young’s shirt, Maguire grabbed Young around the waist, and Young immediately went to the ground. Referee Andy Madley immediately blew his whistle and pointed to the spot. Penalty.

But then Matt Donohue, the VAR official over at Stockley Park today, got involved. I wrote this about Donohue two days ago:

So when Donohue called Madley to the sideline, I was nervous.

Rightly so.

Because Donohue only allowed Madley to see one angle of the incident—an angle that showed Maguire’s waist grab, but not De Ligt’s shirt pull. He didn’t show Madley any other angles—all of which clearly showed De Ligt pulling Young’s shirt.

Madley watched the one angle, decided Maguire’s actions weren’t enough for a penalty, and reversed the call.

Here’s what Madley should have seen

This video, filmed by user @tacticallymatt1 on X, clearly shows De Ligt pulling Young’s shirt.

And here’s a still from the broadcast, clearly showing the shirt pull.

Now, look. A shirt pull in the penalty box is not an automatic penalty.2 It’s up to the referee’s discretion whether or not to award a penalty. But the referee can’t utilize his own discretion if he isn’t shown the damn shirt pull in the first place.

The Premier League issued a statement pretty quickly on the matter.

Well, less of a statement, and more of a quick recap of what happened, offering no context or anything else that might be helpful to those seeking answers.

Thanks, Premier League media folks! Very helpful.

Look. There’s no way of knowing if Everton would’ve won the match if the correct call stood. Andre Onana could’ve blocked the penalty kick.3 Beto could’ve missed it entirely. 4

But we should’ve had the chance to score that winning goal, regardless what the outcome would have been. We didn’t get that chance, though, because of a terrible system that is ruining the game of football in countless ways.`

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F O O T N O T E S

OF EVERYTHING THE FRIEDKIN GROUP HAS DONE correctly since purchasing Everton, this might be the most important.

According to The Bobble, that wizard of Everton news-breaking, “Everton have hired Academy scouts in Italy, Spain, Portugal and Scandinavia as part of the ongoing restructuring of the Academy.”

What’s the big deal?

I realize this news isn’t as exciting as the rumor that Carlo Ancelotti wants to bring Jarad Branthwaite to Real Madrid.1

But it is a huge deal. Let me explain why.

Everton has kept their youth scouting narrowly focused on England and surrounding areas for over a decade. Before Satan Farhad Moshiri came along, Everton was renowned for finding young prospects for the Academy and developing them into first-team-ready players who, if they couldn’t break through into our first squad, could be sold for a tidy sum.

That mentality went by the wayside with Moshiri, who believed less in scouting and development than he did in spending shitloads2 of money to bring in players with some name value, regardless of their fit for our system.

This new focus should change that. It won’t happen immediately. Setting up scouting networks, especially in foreign countries where we’ve yet to operate, takes time. But this sort of move should pay significant dividends five or ten years as we compete with the world’s biggest clubs for the attention of hot young prospects. Our new stadium will be a substantial part of enticing those youth players.

Referees Assigned for the United Match

Andy Madley has been appointed referee for Saturday’s match against United. Madley’s had some bad reffing performances during Everton matches. Real bad. I’ll give him credit and say he did a good job during last season’s Merseyside Derby at Anfield, which Everton won 2-0. You probably remember that one.

Matt Donohue will handle VAR duties. If Donohue’s name sounds familiar, it’s because he’s the guy who disallowed Beto’s late equalizer against Southampton, which resulted in The Good Guys (Everton) losing 1-0. It was a bad call, which the Premier League excused by noting it was Donohue’s second time on VAR duty.

So, I have an idea. Perhaps these fellas should practice using VAR technology during a slew of summer friendlies? There’s a bunch of them. Nobody really watches pre-season friendlies.

There’s no pressure to get calls right because nobody cares.

Do it, and the officials will have some experience with the VAR process and tools for the games that matter.

Or we could stick with what we have now, a completely broken system everybody hates.

Fans Pen Letter Over Bramley-Moore Transportation

On Monday night, the club held the first of three test games at the new Bramley-Moore Dock stadium. 10,000 lucky fans became the first to attend a match at BMD between the Everton U18 squad and Wigan.3 I absolutely would’ve gone, except I live in Austin.

I watched the live stream, and boy, does that stadium look good. I can’t wait to see it in person when I visit in December.

But it seems like it’s not all roses…especially regarding parking.

But Everton Fans' Forum expressed concerns about transport, parking and safety at Sandhills station, the closest Merseyrail station to the ground.

Liverpool City Region Combined Authority said they would be taking on board feedback from those who attended the event "to see whether immediate steps can be taken to address the issues raised".

It said Liverpool City Region mayor Steve Rotheram would also be meeting with supporters and "publicly respond to specific concerns they have outlined."

The under-18s fixture on Monday was held amid a vocal backlash against an experimental parking scheme around Regent Road and the surrounding streets as well as the installation of a fan management system at Sandhills station.

If I’m reading this correctly: the BMD parking situation is a shitshow.

The restrictions mean any business within a 30-minute walk of the stadium must pay an annual £50 permit per vehicle to park at any time - not just on match days. That’s…not cool, guys.

Liverpool Councillor Dan Barrington, though, sounds downright optimistic about all of this. Barrington, the cabinet member for transport and connectivity, said some words that seemed designed to confuse the listener and also not really say anything at all. Like a true politician.

"By creating this new match day parking zone, we'll be looking to adopt and incorporate those controls which so effectively move tens of thousands on a weekly basis," Barrington said.

You can always count on a politician to say stuff.

Good job, then, Dan.

🔥 ToffeeFest 2025 is Coming to San Diego. Who’s Coming With Me?

The North American Toffees supporter group had a fantastic time at the first inaugural ToffeeFest in Chicago last year. I don’t know. I wasn’t there.

But I’m damn sure going to the 2025 edition, which is taking place April 11-13th in San Diego. There’s all kinds of fun things4 planned, and also a San Diego Padres game.5 I’m registering on ToffeeLink as we speak, and my flight is booked. I’m excited to meet some of you folks.

Get more information on ToffeeFest 2025 at the official website. If you plan on attending, reply to this email or drop me a line at jeremy@readthetower.com.

FRIENDS OF THE TOWER

I like to close out each newsletter I write with links to some cool stories I think you should read. Today, I’m going to link you to some very cool people who you should follow:

🎙️ THE BLUE FRONTIER: I think it’s the premiere Everton analysis podcast. You should really give it a listen. And they have an incredible Discord.

🧔🏻 ANDREW MILLINGTON Andrew is our community lead here at The Tower, or will be once we have a community going. The kindest human you will meet on this Earth.

F O O T N O T E S

Moyes has Everton flying high heading into United match

I believed David Moyes was the right choice for Everton manager after the sacking of Sean Dyche. I know many disagreed with me, and they made good points. Moyes is not the very model of a major football manager. Hes not Pep or Claudio Ranieri; he’s not pushing the boundaries of what we thought tactically possible.

But he is the very model of a perfect Everton manager.

• Moyes understands the club, its culture and its fanbase better than anyone who came after it. Dyche had a limited understanding, but not really. Carlo Ancelotti understood what the fans wanted to see. Rafa Benitez1 understood the culture, but he hated it. It was a leftover grudge from his life managing Liverpool.

• Moyes knows that Everton fans, above all else, value hard work, relentless pressing and a complete inability to ever give up.

• Moyes also has the ability to bring out the best in a player, not by belittling them, but by instilling confidence. Moyes has empathy for his players.

• I have much more to say about Dyche in a future piece, but for now, I’ll give you these two key points:

  • His time at Burnley instilled in Dyche a belief that his system was infallible and that any shortcomings on the pitch were not the result of his system, but of the players inability to adapt to his tactical setup.

  • When it became clear his system was not working with this squad of players, he didn’t adapt his system to play to their strengths. He simply gave up, telling the board that he’d taken this squad as far as he could take them.

This is not true. Not in the slightest. Dyche could have turned his flailing Everton squad into a creative , goal-scoring team. But Dyche has an unearned self-belief in his own tactical acumen. All you have to do is watch his Masterclass video and you’ll see what I mean.

His stubbornness and absolute refusal to adapt, either to the modern-changing game or to in-game moments that require adjustments—will continue to hamper him wherever he next lands a managerial job.

🔢 Stat of the Day

Before his return, the Toffees had managed only 15 goals in 19 league matches - the fourth-lowest tally in their history - while their expected goals (xG) tally of 18.33 was the lowest in the division. In just six league games under Moyes they have already managed 12 goals - from an xG of 8.12.

SOURCE: T H E G U A R D I A N

OTHER NEWS

Everton Stadium’s first test match is an unqualified (and stunning) success

The sadness we feel at seeing the Grand Old Lady go is mitigated—at least in part—by knowing what awaits us on the banks of the River Mersey.

The new Bramley-Moore Dock Everton Stadium2 stadium is an elite football stadium that puts us on even footing with Tottenham and other European clubs who have unveiled new-ish stadiums over the past 5-10 years. On Monday, we got our first glimpse of what it’ll look like on match days when the Everton U18 team took on Wigan.

It wasn’t a good match for the U18 squad. Wigan Athletic may be a League One resident, but they’re still talented enough to see off a U18 team.

The only complaint from fans was about the camera angle being used for the broadcast. It was..not good. But Everton hero Alan Myers assuages our fears with this tweet:

You can watch the full test match on YouTube here:

Silly Season is in Full Swing

People think of “Silly Season” as the time of year when transfer rumors start making their way through Euroean newspapers. I won’t disagree that it’s exciting to open up my favorite sports page to find out that Everton is making a play for Jude Bellingham or Lionel Messi or some other historical player.

But it’s bullshit. Or at least 99.5% of it is bullshit.

I’m going to let you in on a ittle publishing world secret: Silly Season is basically another term for making up stories to sell newspapers. 3

Today’s dumb thing concerns Real Madrid allegedly trying to secure the services of Jarrad Branthwaite.

Here’s how it generally works:

1. A newspaper in Spain or somewhere else makes up a story about a club being ineterested in a player. Sometimes, the story says the club and player are deep in negotiations. They are not. In fact, these newspaper articles are often the first time the player, his agent and the teams in question have heard anything about the story.

2. A newspaper from a different country picks up the story, rewrites it to add even more bullshit, and then publishes it under a headline that would make any reasonable human believe the deal is done. And because humanity is largely done with reading anything other than a headline, they start telling their friends it’s a done deal.

3. Meanwile, dozens of other papers begin reprinting the story. The sources they list in the articles are other papers who have published the story. Not only are they linking to the original fictional story; they are doing zero diligence to find out if the story has any truth to it.

4. In less than 24 hours, supporters from the receiving team truly believe that an awesome new player is coming in to join their squad, only to be crushed when they finally find out it’s not true. And it has never been true.

I’m stunned that we don’t take these stories for what they are: Complete and utter fiction. But, nope. We play along every year, and the international sports media is more than happy to play along for one reason: money.

Truth doesn’t exist anymore. Not really. 4

Upcoming Schedule:

Everton (7-7-9; 30 points) vs. Manchester United (8-5-12, 29 points)

Goodison Park | 7:30 a.m. ET | USA Network

F O O T N O T E S

GOALS

42: Beto
47: Jean-Philippe Mateta
80: Carlos Alcaraz

On Saturday, a depleted Everton squad scored three crucial points in a 2-1 away win over Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park.

The win moved Everton to 13th, one point ahead of Manchester United and Tottenham. Everton’s form since David Moyes's return has been spectacular; they are nothing like the team managed by Sean Dyche until his sacking in January.

Let’s dive into my thoughts on the match and then look ahead to the rest of the season.

A Fighting Team

Despite missing one of their most crucial pieces in the creative engine, Iliman Ndiaye, Everton was able to go into Selhurst and stop Palace’s momentum cold.

This is the sort of match I would’ve dreaded a little more than a month ago.

And to be frank, I was hoping for a draw, at best.

The lack of Ndiaye and Dwight McNeil, not to mention attacking options in DCL and Armando Broja, had me feeling uneasy. Plus, the team was coming off an emotional and draining draw at the final Merseyside Derby at Goodison just three days ago. It was hard to imagine a tired team going into an away game and stealing even one point from an in-form Palace team.

But that’s just what they did.

It wasn’t always pretty. But there were a few things evident in the way the team played that helped secure the win.

• Belief: In a stunningly short amount of time, Moyes has this squad believing in itself again. Perhaps for the first time.

• Fight: Even after Palace leveled at 47 minutes, the players demeanor did not change. Under Dyche, the opponent tying the match would have led to a visible change in effort and overall spirit. That didn’t happen today. They continued to fight and believe.

• Creativity: Moyes has taken the shackles off these players. Instead of being shackled to Dyche’s regimented, defense-first approach, players like James Garner and Carlos Alcaraz have been given freedom to try things Dyche never would have allowed.

And now, a few more thoughts on today and on Everton’s future:

The Damnation of Dycheball

If I owned a football club of any renown, I would be hard-pressed to give Sean Dyche another chance at management. I’ll always be grateful to Dyche for coming into a thankless job and keeping Everton in the Premier League.

But Everton’s performances since his sacking last month have brought two things to the fore:

1. Dyche’s stubbornness or sheer inability to adapt his preferred tactical style.** His time at Burnley seemed to instill in him an unwavering belief that his tactics are irrefutable and will work in any situation, so long as the players buy-in and adapt. That is not the case. The best managers adjust their style to the strengths of their players. They find what the people in their squad are good at and accentuate those strengths.

2. The way Dyche gave up on the Everton players, saying he’d taken this group of players as far as he could, should be the first thing on his resume. It won’t be, but it should. I think Dyche meant it as an indictment of his players. In reality, it was an indictment of him as a manager. Dyche’s Everton players were beaten down, depressed, and lacking any belief in themselves. Instead of picking them up, Dyche tossed them aside.

What David Moyes has done in his short time in charge hasn’t been a miracle. It hasn’t been a revelation. Moyes is not reinventing the wheel. What he’s doing is what any good football manager does: setting up his team to play to the strengths of the players on that team.

Most importantly, he’s instilling some confidence they’d lost under Dyche. The difference is visible on the pitch. You can see it.

“The players have reacted well. It has been a dream start coming in and winning so many games. Starting to look more healthy in the league” Moyes said. “I hope it will be the case. Ultimately I am thinking we still have to get enough points. It has been a brilliant start. It was a good win for us today, really scrappy. They showed great resilience and won at a difficult place against a team who have been improving.”

“Since the manager has come in we have definitely improved,” James Tarkowski said. “I don’t think we were great today but we took our opportunities. We are still working to get better. On a day like today, we stuck at it and got the win.”

Beto

For 18 months, we watched Beto struggle to find himself. We watched because he did not attempt to hide it. His agony over his struggles was right there, displayed on his face for all of us to see. It mattered to him that he was struggling.

Beto has never given up, even throughout a long and discouraging drought. The man fights and fights and fights. He never takes himself out of a match, even when things continually went bad for him.

This is why seeing him celebrate now is so much sweeter. It’s vindication.

Dyche never set up for the big man for success. He never played to his strengths, one of which is his actual strength. The man is a monster. Dyche never adapted his tactics to utilize Beto’s most significant assets.

The difference is stark.

“I am playing with more confidence and joy. We are playing better football and the team is confident. We want to win every game,” Beto said. “Today we deserved to win and it is like this.”

Beto is now a proper Everton #9. He’s a proper Everton center forward, and his play against Palace showed that. And truthfully, even when Dominic Calvert-Lewin returns from injury, he shouldn’t be our first-choice forward. That’s Beto’s job now, and it should remain so.

Calvert-Lewin is leaving this summer, and that’s okay. I never would’ve said this until the past two weeks or so, but…we should let him go. He’ll be seeking a big contract, and that’s money we can spend in better places.

He’s had some wonderful moments for us over the past half-decade, and I hope he goes to Newcastle or wherever and finds a lot of success. I hope he stays healthy.

But he’s not the guy up front for Everton anymore. Beto is. Our focus in the summer window should be on finding depth for the position, not finding a starter. Whether that’s Chermitti or someone we find in the market.

We’ve got our starter now.

Season Outlook

It’s difficult for Evertonians to maintain a rosy outlook on the future. We have been conditioned to expect bleakness.

I think we are out of the woods now. I can’t fathom this team melting down and flirting with relegation again. It’s February, and I’m not worried about what league we will play in next season.

That’s one hell of a feeling, isn’t it, Blues?

Updated February 17, 2025 - 11:31 a.m.