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Blues Mahoney wrote: Wed Sep 02, 2026 2:25 pm
Hmmm not sure on that.
It's more like barring any injuries to RB, LB CB, Grealish or ST, we can try and aim for top half.
Otherwise it's duking it out bottom half
I'd say injuries to 4 or 5 of your starting 11 would be considered a crisis to any team outside of the top 2.
Unless Myko is one of them, we can deal with injuries to any 2 of them at the same time i reckon.
If Branthwaite gets injured that's terrible for obvious reasons.
If Mykolenko get injured that's also terrible because Branthwaite will have to play left back.
Absolutely insane how we've managed to end up here.
The biggest issues are LB and Striker. If there are injuries to those 2 positions then there is no backup.
Yes there are players that can play there as a last resort but that’s only because they are broadly a defender / striker.
Johnson for example will suffer as a sole striker. He’s not a particularly hard worker (see Palace fans summary), not tall and not particularly strong or good in the air. His main strength would be as a second striker, arriving late into the box at the back post. But that needs a main striker to drag the defenders across the 6 yard box to the front post. No Barry = Johnson being marked and ineffective.
No Myko would be a disaster just as it has been in his absence over the past few seasons. We have just made do as we always have. And we will have to merely make do again.
I think this transfer committee thing needs binning off. I’m not sure what the solution is but it’s not that, Nor is it leaving it all up to the manager
One senior striker left at the club, trying to sell a fan favourite potential star, let's be kind and say limited options at fullback all in the last weekend of the window.
We are a few suspensions/injuries away from having to have at the very least under 21's on the bench if not starting in PL matches.
NickNack wrote: Wed Sep 02, 2026 4:16 pm
I think this transfer committee thing needs binning off. I’m not sure what the solution is but it’s not that, Nor is it leaving it all up to the manager
Not a lot of joined up thinking from them as a group is there?
The structure itself is fine if you don't have an autocratic manager, but when you do there'll invariably be an impasse on many players as the vision of one party will likely not match the other.
They have brought in a lot of young high potential players, so there's some validity to their approach, but if everyone's constantly compromising, or refusing to, you end up in a right mess, as we have.
Everything needs a reset for next summer, a structure needs to be in place that operates smoothly with everyone pulling in the same direction.
Remains the case, first eleven in my opinion, probably better than last season. The issue is how likely we get 30 plus games out of them? Holding onto hope Branthwaite,Grealish, Barry and a few others are essentially injury free is a big ask. We could get lucky but this is Everton so. First eleven good, squad is poorer than when we started
Just had a look at the lineup for our match against Man UTD 2 seasons ago just to see how the squad compares.
2024 / 2025
Pickford
O'Brien
Tarks
Branthwaite
Myko
Lindstrom
Garner
Gana
Doucoure
Harrison
Beto
Subs
Begovic
Young
Ireobugnam
Alcaraz
Virginia
Keane
Dixon
Heath
Sherif
Now I'm not defending the club here, just wanted to show things have been worse before, and we finished 13th that season despite being in serious relegation trouble until Moyes came in halfway through.
