As Everton fought their way to Premier League survival last season, the squad creaked under the pressure.
It wasn't just that Frank Lampard had to deal with a miserable injury crisis - often the manner and timing at which problems emerged felt like a cruel joke. There was Donny van de Beek finally looking ready to play a role only to be injured minutes before kick-off at West Ham United. There was Ben Godfrey suffering a similar fate at Anfield weeks later.
Then there was the careful management of Yerry Mina and Fabian Delph, and the likes of Seamus Coleman and Allan who were involved despite carrying injuries that took much of the summer to recover from. Lampard's hands were further tied by suspensions but the final months of the last campaign were also an emphatic embodiment of a troubled and wasteful transfer strategy that lurched in different directions as managers and directors of football changed.
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This season, it is a different story. Everton's summer, in part influenced by the financial consequences of past excess but also shaped by the strategic review launched last winter with the ambition of charting a new, more sustainable path at Finch Farm and in the transfer market, saw eight new arrivals and the first moves of Lampard and director of football Kevin Thelwell to mould the squad according to their own ideas.
Toward the end of last season, Lampard was clear in one key element of the club's summer plans. Perhaps scarred by the early months of his reign, he repeatedly used the word "robust" when talking about the efforts to strengthen.
James Tarkowski, the first signing as he moved on a free transfer from Burnley, was the embodiment of this plan. In each of the five previous Premier League seasons he had played more than 30 games - actually playing every league fixture in the 2019/20 campaign. Months later he would be followed by Conor Coady, now Tarkowski's centre-back partner. Coady, who is on loan but available for Everton to buy at the end of the season, missed just one league game in the last four seasons at parent club Wolverhampton Wanderers.
Their signings have enabled Lampard to do what he could not do last year - field a settled central defence. The importance of both deals was made clear in the opening days of the campaign when Mina and Godfrey, two of the three starting centre-backs in the season opener against Chelsea, each suffered long-term injuries in that game. Mason Holgate, who replaced Godfrey, then sustained his own injury a few games later at Brentford. Yet despite these setbacks, Everton boast the best defensive record in the Premier League and do so largely because of the nature of those summer signings.
A similar story has unfolded in the centre of midfield. It took time to get there - by the last pre-seaseon friendly and then that game against Chelsea, Lampard was forced to play a makeshift pairing of Abdoulaye Doucoure and Alex Iwobi due to injuries. But the club survived that tricky start, Iwobi impressing in his new position before being bolstered by the arrivals of Amadou Onana, Idrissa Gueye and James Garner and Tom Davies' return to fitness. This meant the club was able to withstand the loss of Doucoure, the only fit and recognised centre midfielder for the Chelsea match, when he suffered an hamstring issue in the following game at Aston Villa.
There is still a lot to do but then the overhaul of the squad was always going to take more than one transfer window. It may yet take several. And it can open up potential issues too - in Dele Alli, Allan, Jean-Philippe Gbamin and Andre Gomes, Everton have been able to find opportunities elsewhere for several midfielders not at the centre of Lampard's plans. He is aware, however, that his squad will have a lot of centre-backs once those who are injured have recovered. With the switch to using two centre backs since the game at Leeds United, it is likely at least one senior centre-back will be left out of the matchday squads if all six are available.
When asked by the ECHO if he felt more comfortable in this season's squad being able to cope with the intensity of a season disrupted by the World Cup, Lampard said: "We are in a better place but I hate to say that because I don’t want to tempt fate. You never know what can happen. We are not absolutely flush in certain areas but I wanted a squad that had competition in every place, people who can push each other on. We are getting closer to that level, midfield for sure – you can see it there. Once our centre-back get fit, in their different time scales, in the second half of the season we will have a lot of centre-backs."
One area Lampard became vocal about the need to strengthen, particularly following the sale of Richarlison, was going forward. While the injury to Dominic Calvert-Lewin has hampered Everton's start to the season, he is not panicking though - largely thanks to the initial efforts of new signings Neal Maupay and Dwight McNeil, who have scored a match winner each in Everton's last two games. Speaking ahead of the Southampton match that saw McNeil's strike give his side the three points, Lampard explained: "At the moment I am pretty happy and I will be happier when Dominic is fit and firing."
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