Verumex

Nope, just very bored

They should. For a young player, probably still a bit nervous, in his first appearance for his club, at a critical moment in their cup run, he did great. I tried to be objective, covering both positive and negative as I saw it. I'm not trying to be a downer. He's got plenty of room to improve, and if that's his floor, I look forward to seeing where his ceiling is.

Can't believe he didn't push JJ off the pitch, cover LB and RB single handed, and go on to score a hattrick. What a terrible signing.

Stoke v Cardiff FA Cup Subbed on at 80 mins, + 9 minutes injury time + 30 minutes extra time RW for 34 mins, LW for last 15. Off the ball movement seemed great, he was always finding space or dragging a defender wide. Weak in the air, most defenders were taller than him and he struggled to win headers. On the Right Wing he seemed to struggle to dribble past defenders and often had to pull the ball back, but didn't lose possession often. On the Left Wing he was a lot more successful in beating his man, worked the ball into the box a few times, and got a shot on target, unfortunately right into the keeper's arms. He didn't seem to show much creativity on the ball, but showed a good work rate when taking on defenders. I don't know if he was more confident on the left, he got used to the pace of the game by the time he switched, or if he was against slower defenders, or a combination of the above. He was a big threat in the last 15 minutes. Wasn't too impressed with his defensive movements and pressing, but that could be due to manager instructions to stay forward when possible. He did not get involved in defending set pieces either, likely due to his height. The score stayed 3-3 for the entire time he was on the pitch. I wouldn't say that he had an impact on the game, but he certainly wasn't invisible either.

I wonder what happened at the 60 minute mark that seemed to cause us to revert to our bad form of the last two months while Ndidi has been out...

I could be wrong, but something tells me that Brighton can't recall him, and that we would have to agree to it, but what do I know...

Daka's pace against Vestergaard and Coady...? He would treat us like we're Spartak Moscow.

Is that not the entire point of this forum?

Que?

Can the Wimpy kid play CB?

I take it that this is going nowhere?

They reportedly had a 17 year old Haaland and his dad in Goodison ready to sign.

I think that would make all of this worth it.

You genuinely think that Cooper could have done better without Hermansen or Ndidi? How would we score goals without his favourite Shadow Striker Ndidi?!

It's a brilliant article that came out at the perfect time, really. And the best part about Okoli declaring the shoes thing as being not true, is that it confirms that the players have all read it, including the bit about them all being bang average and on inflated wages, too comfortable to sit back and enjoy life. It's a message that I feel has not filtered through to them until now.

This was another issue highlighted by Percy in his article. Percy is supposed to be the most clued in outsider on the inner workings of our club, yet even he doesn't know what's part of basic operations.

We'll have to make do with Woyo

I think it's clear that Ruud needs to be backed. He's the only one that seems to want to change anything, and if he's seeing fightback from the players, then tbh I think that's a good sign. As has been said, the culture needs to change, and we can't keep getting behind the players everytime there's a rift between them and the managers. Someone needs to get through to them, and if the fans start chanting for him instead of them, it might help him get through to them.

I'm not necessarily saying that Ndidi is the magic player to bring us wins, but that when a team with a lackluster squad like ours loses it's key players, it should be expected for results to start going against us. Our form didn't drop when Ruud joined, it dropped when the two big injuries hit us. That's the clear cause and effect I've seen.

So no-one else noticing that the run of bad form comes immediately after both Ndidi and Hermansen get injured? We had a run of bad form last year too around this time. I wonder what happened then... Oh yeah, Ndidi was injured. Almost like there's a direct pattern and cause and effect there, that has absolutely nothing to do with the manager. Everyone here is delusional if they think that the manager is the weak link.

Yeah, seriously what is Rudkin playing at, he just needs to hit the space bar a couple of times.

Yup, so if we assume a 25% clause, (it's likely a bit higher if it's there), then that's why I took £1m off of £4m to get £3m.

Let's breakdown what this profit would actually be... Assuming that it's the £10m+£3m extras figure that's being floated. The extras we likely won't see this year. let's assume that Everton have a sell on percentage, because why wouldn't they? We'll say 25% because it makes it easier. So that's £4m profit this window, with £1m going to the Scousers. That only leaves us with a £3m profit. What even is the point of selli- Oh FFS this is how we're buying Woyo isn't it...?

No chance they didn't imo

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