Everton face a huge nine days as Frank Lampard looks to engineer a route to Premier League safety.
The Blues do not play again until April 20, providing the backroom team with a long period to work on tactics and for players to rest and recuperate.
Weekend results led to the club restoring the four point cushion to the bottom three. Speaking before Burnley’s defeat at Norwich, Lampard said he believed the key to the break in the schedule would be to maintain the positivity created by Everton’s win over Manchester United on Saturday.
The lunchtime victory, secured through Anthony Gordon’s deflected first-half strike, laid the foundation for a weekend in which momentum swung towards Everton in the battle for survival.
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With biggest rivals Burnley losing 2-0 at bottom club Norwich, the gap lost in Everton’s defeat to the Clarets on Wednesday was quickly restored.
That result at Carrow Road also further boosted the good feeling around Finch Farm after the battling win 24 hours earlier.
Crucial now for Lampard is bridging the gap between matches without losing momentum - with last month’s international break being followed by the defeats at West Ham and then Burnley.
Asked whether he planned to do anything different with the second significant break in just a few weeks, Lampard said on Saturday: “We will work on the team, we will work a bit on the team in terms of the defence and offensive side but the most important thing is to keep the feeling now.
“I think this is going to be about people, about players, about how we broach it as a squad, so over the course of the 10 days a bit of rest, good feeling in training, positive feeling, nothing negative and be ready for Leicester.”
Two vital differences to the last break are none of his stars are away on international duty and several have recovered from injuries.
Lampard said: “The difference is we will have everyone together [for this break]. We didn’t for that, we lost a few players and that, in reality, affected what we could do with teamwork. So the last break was good for us individually to work on a few players - we saw [Fabian] Delph fit again and Dominic [Calvert-Lewin] get extra fitness, that was a positive.”
Everton are hopeful centre back Yerry Mina will be fit again once this break concludes.
Also speaking after the victory over Manchester United, goalscoring hero Gordon highlighted the importance of maintaining the momentum created by the win.
Referring to past seemingly-crucial wins that were not followed up with good performances - including the stoppage time win over Newcastle United ahead of the last break - he said: “We have done this plenty of times. Where we have had big results at Goodison and then not followed it up. That is just one win. We need to keep going and become a winning machine as the gaffer says, and you know, God knows where that can take us.”
