Everton are a club in the middle of turmoil right now. The summer transfer market saw the big teams spend crazy money on players. In a bid to challenge the big boys of the English league, owner Farhad Moshiri and the Everton board sanctioned Ronald Koeman a heavy transfer budget who brought in an arsenal of summer signings that saw Everton spend a net amount of £142.38m.
Tipped by many to challenge the ‘top six’, Koeman’s side was expected to secure a European spot this time. Eleven matches into the domestic season and Everton are languishing at the bottom half of the table with eleven points from as many games.
Their record against the top teams in England has been abysmal. The Merseyside club has just collected a grand total of one point from their five big matches against Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur, with the 1-1 draw at the Etihad the only time they avoided defeat. Everton have conceded 15 goals in their five matches against Manchester United, Manchester City, Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham.
To intensify the problems at the club, things on the European front have been even worse. They are at the bottom of their group table with just one point from four games. They have no chance of qualifying and the three defeats in four European matches have seriously questioned the quality of the squad in place.
Actions had to be taken and their manager Ronald Koeman was sacked, as it is always believed to be the most obvious solution in the world of football when a club is malfunctioning.
Koeman, who led Everton to a 7th place finish last season, was defiant of his chances of survival at the club till the very end but had to pay the ultimate price when Everton’s fortunes continued to deteriorate. Koeman had been in the Premier League for over three years and in his first two seasons, he led Southampton to a seventh and a club-record sixth place finish respectively. It seemed that old history counted for little as Everton relieved Koeman of his duties and are now looking at new options.
One manager who has come into the reports is Unai Emery of Paris Saint Germain. Moshiri had chased the PSG manager back in the summer of 2016 but failed to bring him to Merseyside. While things at Paris cannot be any better on the footballing front, there have been several reports of unrest in the dressing rooms, with Neymar particularly reported to be unhappy with Emery’s training session.
Should PSG decide to show Emery the door and bring in another manager, the Spaniard could be on his way to Everton. But can he be the man to relieve them of their current predicament?
