Now is not the time for silence.
Once again in crisis, the scenes that unfolded at Goodison Park on Tuesday were depressingly familiar. Everton look set for another fight against a relegation that would be catastrophic for the club, for the city of Liverpool, for Merseyside and beyond. That is not an exaggeration. This does go beyond football.
The situation is too desperate for a vacuum of leadership. Fans who directed their anger at chairman Bill Kenwright, chief executive Denise Barrett-Baxendale and those around them deserve a response. Should Everton’s season continue through to another horrific battle for survival, the board and majority shareholder Farhad Moshiri will no doubt call for a repeat of the electric scenes that saved the club last season. To do so without answering the concerns of those supporters would be arrogant and complacent. Who is doing what to save Everton? Why should they be backed? What reassurance do they think can be taken from their presence?
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The questions are relevant because one of football’s most storied teams is back on Premier League life support, only this time without the talisman whose heroics were crucial to survival just eight months ago. Richarlison was sold for the cash needed as a consequence of one of too many bad decisions that currently haunt this historic club. At present, this battle is also different because Everton risk going into it without an even more potent weapon than Brazil’s number nine. The fanbase that rallied so impressively in the final weeks of last season is angry, frustrated and tired. It has every right to be.
As Pascal Gross pounced upon a dreadful back pass and lofted the ball over Jordan Pickford to put Brighton 4-0 up, the chants of “sack the board” had already begun. They were repeated as Everton whimpered through the final half hour and again on the final whistle. Did everyone join in? No. But what is not up for dispute is that the cries were too loud to be ignored. Everton are yet again in a mess and it is time the supporters are treated with maturity and respect. It is the least they deserve.
Frank Lampard’s side have won one of the past 11 games. They are already in the bottom three. He is not blameless for that. But the world can see he is shackled by the problems he inherited, a legacy of mismanagement and excess. Under Mr Moshiri, Everton have spent more than £500m to go backwards on the pitch. Off it, they have posted huge losses, albeit some for reasons beyond their control. He has appointed six managers and three directors of football and so far all have been unable to bring tangible progress. Mr Moshiri is not without responsibility for the issues facing Everton but he has pumped huge sums into the club. How it has been spent is part of the problem. And he cannot be the only figure who has had a say in that. Mr Kenwright has been on the board throughout. Prof Barrett-Baxendale has been on the board since the summer of 2016, and as CEO since 2018. Others must have had influence.
Last year, the ECHO published a front page open letter to Everton calling for everything to be done to avoid a repeat of last year’s chastening struggle. Printed just hours after the dramatic win against Crystal Palace, I wrote: “However important avoiding relegation was, however unlikely it may have seemed at times, this was not a story of underdog success. It is a story of missed opportunities, bad decisions and the mismanagement of a fortune. It is a horror story of excess, a hellish drama of frustration and impatience that left a beloved and historic institution vulnerable.”
The ECHO's front page from May (below)
A post mortem was needed immediately. Last season, recent seasons, have not been good enough. There is more than football at stake too. Everton FC is part of the fabric of Liverpool and Merseyside. If it suffers a setback, so do other people in other areas. Everton’s new stadium continues to rise on the Liverpool waterfront. The progress is stunning and the project deserves credit and support. It offers the best chance of regeneration in decades for one of the most deprived areas of the UK. Amid the worst moments of last season the club said work would continue in the event of relegation. That may be so. But financing its completion would not be made any easier by relegation. It is also hard to see how the brilliant work of organisations such as Everton in the Community, which saves lives, would not suffer.
Since that incredible night in late May, what has changed? Players have come and gone and during the summer transfer window Frank Lampard took on the unenviable mission of seeking to instil a backbone to the mismatched, Frankenstein squad he inherited. But, it has to be acknowledged, any positives were only positive in context. They could not afford to keep one of their best players. They had to move late in the market because of the uncertainty over survival and then the preference to sell first. Lampard and director of football Kevin Thelwell were hamstrung. The squad they pieced together now sits in the relegation zone after three consecutive home defeats and, while they have to take responsibility for some of that, both have always been fighting the legacy of decisions that have hampered their options.
Those at the top of the club will point to the strategic review as the blueprint for change, their evidence that things are different. There are good ideas stemming from that piece of work. It is said to make the argument for patience, unity and a focus on the academy. It is a long term plan with worthy ambitions but there has to be acknowledgement its potential will not be realised if, in the short term, Premier League survival cannot be maintained. And only the footballing operation was investigated. It is not unfair to question why a strategic review was needed in the first place. And if one was needed, surely the work of those who led it - including Mr Kenwright and Prof Barrett-Baxendale - and the wider club operation also required inspection. Meanwhile, the club’s annual AGM was moved online during the pandemic. In November, plans were announced to amend the articles of association to allow for them to continue to take place virtually. While the pandemic is over, the 2023 meeting is pencilled in to be a virtual one. The creation of a fans forum “to provide an open, honest, transparent and independent dialogue with the club and its supporters” is welcome. But it only goes so far.
Have your say on the future of Everton in the ECHO's survey HERE
Everton will point to communication as a strong point of the club, particularly in comparison to others. Mr Moshiri published two open letters over the summer. Prof Barrett-Baxendale writes regularly in the club programme. But there is a stark difference between carefully manicured statements and press releases, delivered from afar, and genuine communication. For the new year, Prof Barrett-Baxendale wrote of 2022 as “a year of resilience and progression”, adding: “On and off the pitch, vital groundwork has been laid through hard work, collaboration, and unity to set us on a more positive path driving forward. The rewards for some of that work will take time to materialise, but we are confident we have put in place building blocks for a more stable, robust future.” Less than a fortnight later the fear is even greater that that future may not be in the top flight. The last public comments from Mr Kenwright, meanwhile, praised Everton supporters for their incredible effort at the vital Leicester City away win in May.
In normal times that may be enough but these are not normal times. The club’s Premier League status is in serious danger along with all that goes with it - including, potentially, countless jobs and the impact the loss of top flight football may have on the many positive initiatives the club is rightly proud of.
In the aftermath of Everton being pulled apart by Brighton there was silence from the top. After another damaging defeat and as questions swirled over the future of Lampard, no-one came out to back him. Hours went by. Confirmation he would remain in place for the FA Cup match with Manchester United essentially came through the invite to the press conference it was said he would be leading. Lampard’s appointment was hailed as a key consequence of the strategic review’s initial findings. As mentioned above, that review preached unity - as well as the importance of big decisions being made by the board as a collective. Yet where was the support for the public face of their operation - the person who the board may be tied to because his removal so soon into his Blues career would undermine the cultural reset claimed to have been made? And what of that collegiate approach to the key decisions? The consensus since Brighton seems to have been that Lampard’s fate lies in the hands of Mr Moshiri alone. He last attended a game at Goodison Park when Watford hammered Rafa Benitez’s side in October 2021.That a manager could be sacked by a majority shareholder who has not seen him lead a side out once is a damning symbol of the problems running through the club. That Lampard’s opening gambit in the transfer window - one that it has been clear for months that he would need help in - is the return of a promising but now pressure-laden academy graduate is also of concern.
What is the true state of play at Everton? No-one expects the club to publish its transfer budget or the conditions Lampard needs to meet in order to stay on. But right now Everton are in deep trouble and while the chants of ‘sack the board’ were clear against Brighton the most troubling sound, perhaps, was the silence that greeted the capitulation. Fans are worried. Fans are scared. Fans are resigned to the chaos they are, so tragically, becoming used to.
On Friday night more than 9,000 Everton supporters will travel to Old Trafford days after Christmas, during a cost of living crisis and despite having their support exploited by tickets priced far in excess of Premier League away day limits. As was clear last season, and at Manchester City on New Year’s Eve, they are the club’s biggest asset. If Everton’s board want to call on them to save the club once again then those supporters deserve honesty, they deserve answers and they deserve respect.
Now is not the time for silence. Supporters are being invited to protest against the management of Everton after the next home against Southampton. If Everton’s board will not make a case for themselves, then how can they expect anyone else to?
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