The confirmation came after 8pm - but the writing had long been on the wall for Frank Lampard.
Finally, after weeks of speculation, Lampard was informed by Farhad Moshiri on Monday afternoon that his time in charge of Everton was over. A telephone conversation is believed to have taken place between the two.
The conversation brought an end to a very sorry situation, both for the club and Lampard. Another new manager hunt is underway, but where does Lampard go from here?
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It would be incredibly harsh to lay all of Everton's problems at the door of the former England international. The fact so few fans called for him to be sacked spoke volumes.
But at the end of the day, Everton’s results simply haven’t been good enough this season. Second from bottom and mired in another relegation battle. The future's looking grim for all connected to the club.
Saturday’s 2-0 defeat to West Ham United followed similar recent losses to fellow strugglers Wolves and Southampton. And for the first time during his Everton tenure, some in yellow shirts looked like they had stopped giving their all for their manager.
The performance was a far cry from the one witnessed when Everton were dumped out of the FA Cup by Manchester United. Although beaten 3-1 at Old Trafford, the Blues’ players put up more than a fight and showed they were still given their all for Lampard, just days after the 4-1 hammering at the hands of Brighton & Hove Albion.
Two questions that have been repeatedly asked since Lampard’s sacking are where did it all go wrong? And when did it all start going wrong?
The answers to both are Tuesday, November 8. The night the Blues crashed out of the Carabao Cup at the hands of Bournemouth.
Lampard made 11 changes to his side that started that night at the Vitality Stadium - the Blues had been beaten 2-0 by Leicester City the Saturday before.
The hammering made it two defeats on the bounce for the Blues, who, to put it bluntly, never recovered from the embarrassing 4-1 loss.
"We treated the game with absolute respect and there was a lot of experience in that side but I learned a lot from the performance, particularly with the manner of the goals we conceded," Lampard said post-match.
"I have to protect players who are playing regularly and we had quite a few players out with knocks. We are going to have a really busy schedule after the World Cup break.
"When players train and ask you to put them in the team and they are paid well by Everton, well come in then and show us what you can do. That was the story of tonight.
"You can only train and repeat but you cannot recreate actual moments that happen in a game, at both ends of the pitch.
"If you make those mistakes repetitively then the answer is simple and that is probably why you don't play so much."
From that moment on, Everton lost all but one of their fixtures under Lampard. The only point they picked up coming away to Manchester City on New Year’s Eve.
There wasn’t any fan connected to the club who didn’t want Lampard to do well.
This was a man who had helped inspire the Blues to safety last season. The image of him bouncing up and down on the roof of one of the executive boxes at Goodison Park with supporters following the dramatic win 3-2 over Crystal Palace will live long in the memory.
But that night at the Vitality Stadium something changed. Just days later, and after Everton had been beaten again by Bournemouth, this time in the Premier League, ugly scenes followed after the full-time whistle.
A six-week break then followed as the Premier League paused for the World Cup, and the hope from all within the club was that a reset and recharge of the batteries would help spark an upturn in fortunes once the season got back underway.
Instead, the complete opposite happened. Everton are yet to win a game since their return to action and results and performances have got worse.
Pinpointing the Bournemouth game might feel like a stretch too far, but looking back now, you can't help but feel that was the moment when the end started to feel inevitable.
All of a sudden doubts emerged over Lampard being the right man for the job, while some supporters were rightly left angry over the fact the chance of winning a trophy, for the first time since May 1995, had been tossed away.
All the momentum and good will Lampard had built up since his arrival last January started to feel like it was drifting away, and from that moment neither he nor his side recovered.
Lampard, like so many before him, ultimately ended up learning that boom is forever followed by bust at the modern day Everton.
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