There is hope for Southampton. For Frank Lampard and Everton – broken, toxic, despairing Everton – there is not even a glimmer. There was mutiny in the stands and monotony on the pitch as a 10th defeat in 13 matches, the latest against a team propping up the Premier League table, continued Everton’s inexorable slide towards the Championship and weakened their manager’s precarious grip on his job.
A few thousand Everton fans stayed behind after the final whistle to demand much-needed and overdue change at boardroom level. None is on the horizon, according to the club’s absent owner, Farhad Moshiri. But relegation is. James Ward-Prowse condemned Everton to a fourth successive home league defeat – the club’s worst run since 1958 – with two polished second-half strikes that delivered the first league win of Nathan Jones’s reign.
