Sean Dyche has challenged Everton to learn from the defeats to Fulham and Manchester United and ‘take on’ the battle for Premier League survival.
The Blues boss said he retains confidence in his squad and does not believe the surge in momentum created by his arrival has come to an end. Instead he has faith they will remain competitive - particularly as absent players begin to return.
His comments come after a disappointing result and performance against Fulham that has left the club perched precariously above the bottom three with seven games to go.
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The 3-1 loss at Goodison Park on Saturday marked a second consecutive defeat for Everton. Under Dyche, they took six points from his first three matches, with wins over Arsenal and Leeds United, offering hope they would pull clear of trouble. The Blues have since won just one of the eight games that have followed, taking a further six points from that run - which did feature fixtures against Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester United and Chelsea.
Asked whether Everton’s form under him had now ‘bottomed out’, Dyche pointed to the calibre of opposition his side had faced recently, the suspension of Abdoulaye Doucoure and new injuries to Seamus Coleman and Amadou Onana, as well as the long-term absence of Dominic Calvert-Lewin, as he insisted he remained confident they could avoid the drop.
Dyche said: “That isn’t an excuse, it is just a reality, and I like to talk in realities when I can. I still believe there is a very good group of players here. Douc will come out of his suspension, the injuries will get fit. Then you look at the group and you go: ‘Right. Let’s take it on’. It’s right there in front of us.”
Asked whether he maintained belief in his players to cope with the pressure of the relegation fight, Dyche called on his squad to learn from the bad experiences of the defeats to Fulham and Man United and find lessons to build on.
He said: “That is part of being a Premier League player. You have to deal with stress, pressure, all of the time. So that is part of their learning… That is when your growth really comes, in these times, because a good day always looks after itself. But when the hard days come, how do you correct your performance, how can you grow from that?
“That is the truth of the market we are in, and that is the truth for the players, to grow from this, not to go: ‘That worries us’. That gets parked. What about building on it? What about us taking strides forwards - like we have been - and correcting it? That is the challenge now.”
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