Not Quite the Leap You'd Think

The second half of last season showed that the club, and it's playing squad, do not seem to be relegation candidates for the new season due to start in August. If you were to ask most Everton fans, myself incuded, they would be feeling a lot more positive about how the club will do over the course of a 38-game season. However, there would still be a number of lingering doubts and ingrained fears beaten into Everton fans over a number of miserable seasons. With this article, I've tried to show that while not suddenly Champions League contenders and world beaters, it may not be as hard as you'd think for the Blues to climb the league table next season.

There's been a lot said and written in recent seasons about the quality of our squad. "Poor", "in decline", and "paper thin" are some of the adjectives that have been used. Throw in a couple of financial years worth of PSR issues, financing the cost of the new stadium, and our general unattractiveness to potential signings, and it can be hard to see how the squad can be improved enough to rise above a thirteenth or fourteenth place finish. 

However, look at who we signed recently: Ndiaye cost £15m, Alcaraz cost just over £12m, and Beto, who has shown the potential to hit between fifteen goals and twenty goals a season, cost £25m (the going rate for a striker of that calibre.). The club has shown that there are decent signings out there for a price that suits our pocket that will improve perfromances. 

Financially, the pressure has eased with regards to PSR, there is increased revenue from the new stadium, including naming rights, and the debts have been restructured by the new owners. This should allow us a modest transfer budget to continue with an improved approach to signing players. 

Of the players due to be out of contract, none of them that seem to be leaving were felt to be match winners. Re-signing Gueye was essential though and this would provide consistancy. Loans and freebies are a valid option and Mangala before his injury, plus Alcaraz, have shown that we are capable of getting this right. 

When you look at Everton's 13th-place finish in the completed league table for last season, there is a gap of 17 points to Nottingham Forest in the closest European qualification spot of seventh, and then a 13-point gap to Brighton in eighth. After Brighton come Bournmouth, Brentford, Fulham then Crystal Palace. While you might think that 17 points and six league placings is a huge gap to make up for a European qualification, it's not when you break it down a little.

None of those teams listed above hammered us last season. We dropped points against them, horribly so against Bournmouth, but we more than held our own. This was in spite of the perceived differences in how we have been run complared to these clubs. Since the end of last season, Brentford have lost a quality manager and are having their better players poached. Palace's small squad will now have to contend with European football. Brighton, while they have money to spend, may well lose players again over the summer and will have ro start afresh in August. None of these teams would or should frighten us next season. 

Also, we had 15 draws last season, the highest amount in the division. It's said that small margins can make a big difference over the course of a season. We did create chances last season, not millions of them, but we did. Converting them was the issue. Next season, the ball crosses the goal line a couple of times more than it hit the post last seasons and there is a positive points swing. Game management was something that was an issue last season, with the timing of subs an issue. We get our subs on five or ten minutes earlier over the course of thirty eight games and again, draws can be turned into wins. 

We were poor at times against the three promoted teams last season. We dropped points with the draw with Ipswich and the loss to Southampton. I don't see the three teams next season being much better and I do think that we will have more in us to pick up more points against them. 

What I will be watching closely next season is how Palace and Forest cope with European football. Balancing this, and remaining competitive in the league, is a difficult act to get right for clubs in our position. It isn't what it was like under Moyes the first time around as I think the gap financially has widened even more than it was fifteen to twenty years ago. However for now, I do think climbing the league table, and potential Eurpean qualification, isn't as out of reach as we would think.