Ben Crawford - Our fate has been accepted
As the bells rang at 11pm on Tuesday night the silence from Finch Farm was deafening.
The fact the day ended without any new additions was nothing short of an abomination. Anthony Gordon had gone for a sizeable fee on Sunday and new boss Sean Dyche would have been expecting incomings, but the fact that none arrived is scandalous to say the least.
All the members of the Everton board are rightly being called out now, and Kevin Thelwell also deserves the questions that are being thrown at him. Sean Dyche has a near impossible job to keep this squad in the Premier League this season, and if the club goes down, then they only have themselves to blame.
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It seems to me that our fate has been accepted and as the only team not to sign a player in January, it could be argued we deserve all we are going to get. The fans will be behind the team, and especially Sean Dyche, come Saturday 12.30pm - but once that is over then the protests against the board will start again, and rightly so! If Sean Dyche keeps this squad up then it will be because of him.
Paul McParlan - Promises, promises!
Every parent knows that if you make a promise to your children and you fail to fulfil that pledge then you have completely taken away their trust in you.
Even worse, they may never believe a word you say again. Farhad Moshiri has consistently failed to heed this basic truism.
When in a recent interview the Everton owner clearly told his audience: “We need a striker and we will get one” - fans were reassured. It seemed he shared supporter’s concerns and was ready to address them.
By the time the transfer deadline ended yesterday, and no new players had arrived, Mr Moshiri had once again made another promise he could not deliver. This is a man whose word is anything but his bond.
In January 2022, Moshiri guaranteed that 'results will improve' and 'we will have a strong second half to the season'. Neither happened during a calamitous campaign during which Everton fortuitously escaped relegation.
When he sacked Roberto Martinez in 2016, he told fans that he would appoint 'a Hollywood manager' somebody to rival Klopp, Guardiola and Mourinho and bring silverware back to Goodison. Instead, he brought us the B lister Ronald Koeman and later replaced him with Big Sam!
Famously he told Everton shareholders in January 2017 that: “We don’t want to be a museum. We need to be competitive, and we need to win.”
It was a statement of intent and ambition that under his leadership the club would be challenging again for silverware at the top level. Sadly, it soon became another broken promise.
Moshiri has seemed increasingly bewildered over the years that Everton fans have tried to hold him to account for the lack of measurable success under his leadership. In any other business, the shareholders would have removed him for his record of underachievement, but he has a 94% holding which makes him totally unaccountable.
He has effectively silenced his opponents within the Goodison corridors of power in a manoeuvre that Josef Stalin would be proud of. We have supposedly implemented a 120-point improvement plan, devised by Director of Football, Kevin Thelwell.
Most of us are still trying to discover where it says, 'don’t buy anyone during a transfer window' or 'save money by chasing a 33-year-old free agent'. Might it not make more sense to simply follow the recommendations of Marcelo Bielsa in his damning report on the state of the current team ? I trust him more than Thelwell.
In his defence, Farhad Moshiri has delivered on one commitment, he has overseen the construction of the new stadium. Most Evertonians are thankful that this iconic arena will soon be our home.
However, the owner neglected one minor detail when he made that promise. He did not give any indication that it would be hosting Championship rather than Premier League football.
Tony Scott - A club on the ropes
Can things seriously get any lower being an Evertonian? Yes, it can, Plymouth Argyle away in November looks more likely by the passing week! Sean Dyche must wonder what on earth he's walked into.
A club on the ropes, a team on the floor, a board with a fractured relationship with its own supporters, the only Premier League club with no new signings, an owner that promised a striker, a football club in a weaker position than it's ever been before and with fixtures against Arsenal and Liverpool on the horizon, you'd be a be brave punter backing Everton for survival this time around.
One positive are the signs at Finch Farm with Sean Dyche making these players fitter than they've ever been but let's be honest if they've thrown seven managers under the bus, they'll throw another under there.
But maybe Dyche can change the culture of this club and especially that dressing room? If you can't be good be fit and proper. That goes for the players and the hierarchy.
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