When the World Cup finished last Sunday, and club football was on its way back, there was a sense of excitement in getting the season kickstarted again. But then I just had that niggly feeling because the Wolves game was getting closer and seemed to get bigger and bigger and bigger.
The nervousness and the anxiety grew in the build-up and I was thinking ‘wow, this is a huge game’. You then see the line-up and you don't see Dominic Calvert-Lewin, I was just thinking ‘where are we going to score goals? How are we going to score goals?’
I think the crowd was sensitive yesterday. We did our bit last year. The crowd constantly turned up and got the players to start showing us something. Boxing Day normally, Goodison Park is rocking, but yesterday it was a very subdued atmosphere.
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We're sitting there, we paid our money, give us something to shout and scream about. They never. Yesterday was a very, very lacklustre performance. I wouldn't say it's about not trying, they were trying, but I couldn't understand the game plan.
I've never known a team make simple things look so difficult. Passes were backwards and sideways, we've got wingers who can't cross the ball and we've got midfielders who don't pass forward. There was no intensity in our style of play. If you want to pass it across the back, it's got to be done for a purpose.
Football is very simple, but they’re complicating it and not getting anywhere. Wolves were there for the taking. They didn't want to be at Goodison, even their fans couldn’t be bothered singing. They weren't interested and this is where Everton need to show ruthlessness, a tough mentality in making it difficult for them.
We scored our goal against the run of play, our first attack and we scored. That should have got the players up the gears. What this team has been guilty of, season after season, is they never take the opportunity. They don’t see the obvious point that Wolves were not up for this, and the chance to make it hell for them.
We’re too soft, too nice. We're not putting in the tackles, not doing the hard yards. We're just expecting a team to roll over for us. Then as the game goes on, Wolves start getting that belief and they make a lot of substitutions, bringing on good, dangerous players to change the game. And we're still stagnant. We're doing absolutely nothing.
We’re in this position in the league because we're not good enough. We scored 12 goals all season because we're not good enough. And Frank Lampard, we all want him to do well, of course we do, he's a fantastic man, but I was expecting a lot more forward thinking play from him.
If you're creating opportunities and you miss them, you go ‘okay, hopefully it'll come’. But the lack of chances we are creating and the lack of pressure we put on the opposition, that is the most concerning part for me. To win football games you need to keep on popping the question and we don't pop the question we don't sense when teams are on the rocks.
I think the fans are getting sick and tired of it. We’ve won three games all season, nearly halfway through.
I'm fully behind Lampard and I understand the problems he faces. Calvert-Lewin not being available is killing how he wants to play football, and it shows because the midfielders don’t even look forward because there's no focal point.
But Lampard has to find the solution. If Calvert-Lewin’s not there, his job is to find a way to win a football game without him. I understand, he's not available and it's really frustrating. But as I said at the start of the season, I blame the board for not replacing Richarlison and expecting Calvert-Lewin to play 40 games over the season, which was so naïve.
This will end on Lampard’s head, but it comes from above. The board put us in this situation back in the summer by never getting a Richarlison replacement. We started the Premier League with no striker for five games. This is the Premier League. So you're already on the back foot and we just can't get out because of the start.
That performance against Wolves really typified our season. No ruthlessness, no desire to win games. No one knows how we're trying to win games. We conceded a very soft goal because there was no intent to close the ball down or follow your man.
We get caught on the counter-attack for the second goal and Wolves get a little lucky, their cross takes a deflection and falls kindly. But the difference in desire between our players tracking back and their lot bombing forward is worrying for fans to see.
Wolves had two players free at the back post and the goalscorer - Rayan Ait-Nouri - was their deepest player at the point they started the counter-attack. They are asking that question by committing men forward and getting the cross in. Everton aren’t asking those questions.
We’re too nice and too naive, and Lampard needs to start being ruthless himself and showing his nasty side now. He needs to show he can make big decisions, pull big players off and not be predictable.
We've got to go to Manchester City next, which is going to be a really difficult game, and then we’ve got Brighton at Goodison Park. I cannot see where our next three points are going to come from. Unless something drastic happens, this team looks like it’s right in the middle of another relegation battle.
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