As Goodison Park began to fill ahead of Everton’s game with Leicester City two topics dominated conversation and neither of them were of the home side facing a relegation battle.
There was the emotion of heading to a late kick-off at the Grand Old Lady in the knowledge that such occasions were running out. And there was the excitement in knowing a win would launch Everton into the top half of the table. After the emphatic victory over Crystal Palace and the battling draw at Fulham, that felt possible. Especially under the lights in L4.
Seven days, three games and just 180 minutes of Premier League action later, Everton supporters knew their Christmas Day fate - that they would spend the next six weeks, including December 25, just one place and one point above the bottom three.
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For Frank Lampard context is everything and focusing on that week in isolation would be to ignore the signs of real progress that have been visible throughout the season. Fans believed better things could be on the horizon as recently as Leicester for a reason. But he also knows the performances of the final week, particularly the 3-0 defeat at Bournemouth, were bad enough to require a reaction.
“It's a reality check of where we are”, he told the ECHO during an interview on the fifth floor of Everton’s team hotel in Sydney this week. “But I think we are in a pretty real position. In terms of what we're trying to do with the squad, what teams around us are doing and have done with their squads, and in a competitive league, there is no right for us to go from the position we were in at the end of last season - staying up against Crystal Palace - to getting to where we really want to be.
"The process is going to include times where we feel good about ourselves, like we did after Palace and after back-to-back wins against West Ham and Southampton, and then times when we feel not so good about ourselves. I don't see there being any other pathway than that. And that's part of the work. And that's what we have to keep focusing on.”
Lampard has always tried to maintain expectations this season. He has repeated the idea Everton can move forward while still suffering bad results on the way. The ambition is for the good days to outnumber the bad ones and to build the foundations for sustainable, long term progress. Going into that final week Everton had produced their best performance of the season to beat Crystal Palace and then earned a battling draw at Fulham in a display Lampard was not “mad” about, but in which he believes some of the qualities he has sought to instil in the team, including resilience, came to the fore.
He said: “I think we're a much more balanced squad now than we were at times last year. I think that's really clear. And I think in terms of results after 13 games and going into the Leicester and Bournemouth week, I think we would have been relatively happy in a way, with an expectancy of getting something out of that week. We didn't get that. And obviously that changes perceptions.”
Lampard believes there were positive signs from the performance against Leicester despite the 2-0 defeat, pointing to the chances that fell to Alex Iwobi and Dominic Calvert-Lewin at the beginning of each half as having the potential to transform the match in Everton’s favour. He stressed that neither performance against Bournemouth was good enough though and, while he does not regret his starting line-up for the Carabao Cup tie in which he made 11 changes - three enforced due to injury - he accepts defeat on the Tuesday may have added pressure on the league game.
While he believes those final games should not be analysed in isolation from the rest of the season, Lampard does think Everton need to react to some of the problems that were exposed by those games - the most obvious being the lack of goals. He said: “I think we have to react because it's the Premier League and it's crucial that we look at us, now. We can see that we haven't had enough threat at the top end of the pitch in recent weeks. Some of that has to be borne in us, me and the players, and whether we can be better.” While getting more goals from the players he already has is crucial, strengthening Lampard’s attacking options is also the club’s priority for the January transfer window.
Everton have struggled in front of goal and the sale of talismanic striker Richarlison in the summer significantly undermined the club’s attacking threat. The injuries sustained by Dominic Calvert-Lewin, who missed the beginning of the campaign with a “freak” knee injury after looking so impressive in pre-season, and who is now sidelined with further problems, have deprived Lampard of his best goalscorer once again. Asked whether he had gambled by starting the season so reliant on Calvert-Lewin being available, Lampard’s position is clear - he anticipated having Calvert-Lewin, had multiple areas of the squad he thought needed work, and always knew the January transfer window would offer an opportunity to continue to build a competitive squad.
He said: “We have Dominic. And I know people know that Dominic had his injury problems, and we bring in Neal [Maupay], but the reality is with the transfer market, at the back end of the window, a striker is the hardest position to recruit in because they are very much at a premium. So when the market is difficult in that area of the pitch it's not as simplistic as to say we could bring in a number nine.”
Lampard wanted to be more solid defensively and have more energy in the centre of midfield, so also had those considerations in the summer. That the January window was just 15 games away was a factor in the club’s transfer policy too. He explained: “When you can't fix the world in one window, sometimes you have to take a plan that says: ‘Ok, well, we're happy now with what we did for the window.’ And I think the general consensus is we were pretty happy. And then the reality is you then miss Dom for most of that period.”
The transfer window was problematic because of how it seeped into the season, but Lampard was happy with business. The additions of James Tarkowski and Conor Coady have transformed the defence while he has started to build a midfield he thinks will grow stronger as the season goes on. Having had the survival battle undermined by defensive injuries last year, and losing a host of central midfielders in the summer from a team that was already light on options in that area, the reality is the whole squad needed work.
Lampard is determined for this to not become a season of ‘what ifs’ for Everton. Had Calvert-Lewin stayed fit and Idrissa Gueye’s signing not been so protracted then both could have helped Everton start the season in much stronger fashion. Had a host of controversial decision s favoured the Blues, they could also be so much better off. Lampard believes Everton could easily have three or four more points. They do not and the hard work continues with the table serving as a stark reminder of the peril facing Everton as the club searches for improvement. It is also a reminder of how close real progress is too - a win against Wolverhampton Wanderers on Boxing Day could move the Blues four points clear of danger and within striking distance of the top half once again.
The margins of success and failure are fine but Lampard is clear in his belief that Everton are stronger than last year and that the defeat at Bournemouth is far from the whole story of the season so far. A fit Calvert-Lewin and the January transfer window present opportunities for Everton to move forward but the World Cup break itself, with the time it offers new signings such as Neal Maupay - who joined one third of the way into the first part of the season - to integrate with the squad could simply lead to further progress.
Reflecting on where Everton currently are, Lampard said: “We are much more solid defensively than what we were last year, and we are much more resilient. We are harder to play through in the middle of the park. In an attempt to change your style and improve a little bit sometimes you have to give and take a little bit but I think the recruitment, particularly in terms of Conor Coady and James Tarkowski, has been a big plus in terms of defending the box, in terms of personality through the team. So that brought a big element of strength through the dressing room.
"It was only two weeks ago that everyone's talking about us having one of the best defensive records and all these things, it just takes the edge off that straightaway. But you have to go back to the reality of it. We've been pretty good when it comes to being solid. And I think that was the first thing that we had to fix.”
*Keep an eye out for the second part of our Frank Lampard exclusive coming soon...
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