There were thousands of them on the pitch, celebrating Everton’s worst season for 24 years. Or more accurately, celebrating that it had not become their worst for seven decades. Relegation battles can do strange things and Everton, a fractured club and a failing team, have become united, a form of inspiration coming amid desperation, a fanbase who were often unhappy when they were higher up the league now jubilant, cavorting because safety was secured. A sense of peril, of imminent disaster, had channelled everything, brought everyone together. “People will say you are celebrating staying up but it means so much,” said Frank Lampard. “People won’t forget this.”
In a way, Everton were galvanised by their hopelessness, by a run that spanned the majority of their season, when they took 11 points from 22 games. They were rescued at the last, saved in symbolic fashion. The team that dug themselves into trouble conjured a great escape. The Goodison atmosphere was integral. Crystal Palace, like Manchester United and Chelsea before them, were beaten by the crowd as much as the players. Mid-table mediocrity would not have been as memorable. Haplessness followed by heroics produced the sort of scenes that even Lampard, with his two decades of experience of defining games, has rarely seen
