We're going to be just fine. Look at them on the pitch pre-match.... They're wizards. The lot of them. All this doom about not signing people is just teeth gnashing and wailing because we haven't made Sky Sports News enough. Success in football isn't dictated by column inches or amounts of time spent on the revolving ticker. It's forged by skill and effort - yes, individuals matter, but it's above all a team game.
Other clubs might have more shiny new faces to wonder about and project hope upon, but we've got plenty of devils that we know and are maybe thus better off, even if that's less exciting. It's kind of harder to get excited about players who you know all their faults, but that's just the 21st century attention deficit at play isn't it? Woosh... Keshi curls it home. Smack... Gaz hits it so hard, it nearly takes Stuart Moore's hand off. Fizz... Virtue tucks a drive away neatly. They look a million dollars in this warm up.
What the fuck are we thinking about going into the season without any new signings? We look shit. Everton have done us twice, scoring piece of piss goals, making Luke Garbutt look like Carlo was spot on in his assessment. You can imagine Everton's wide right players looking puzzled and going 'who???' when asked about what it was like to face our left back today so far away is he from them. The first we give acres of space for a cross to the far post which is then turned home far too easily. The second looks like it could have been offside, but for all Uncle Richard's pointing and shouting and jumping on the spot, the flag doesn't show, the ref isn't interested and we're 2-0 down within ten minutes.
The rest of the half is really, really boring. Everton aren't very good in the global scheme of things but they're enjoying being 2-0 up and just knock it about without much effort and look a league apart from us. Which, to be fair, they are. We run about after them to no real effect. Appleton stands on the touchline musing in a black serious looking tracksuit top. Boring Frank stands on the touchline in leisurewear that makes him look like he's attending a very expensive new money wedding but wearing his dress down clothes as it's the night before the big day and he and all his new money pals are casually lounging in the bar drinking fashionably expensive whisky and talking about fashionably expensive motors whilst their fashionably expensive wives carry big fashionably expensive balloon glasses of gin and big fashionably expensive square glossy paper bags from fashionably expensive boutiques. At least no one is wearing a fucking 'gilet'.
The rest of the half is really, really boring. Everton aren't very good in the global scheme of things but they're enjoying being 2-0 up and just knock it about without much effort and look a league apart from us. Which, to be fair, they are. We run about after them to no real effect. Appleton stands on the touchline musing in a black serious looking tracksuit top. Boring Frank stands on the touchline in leisurewear that makes him look like he's attending a very expensive new money wedding but wearing his dress down clothes as it's the night before the big day and he and all his new money pals are casually lounging in the bar drinking fashionably expensive whisky and talking about fashionably expensive motors whilst their fashionably expensive wives carry big fashionably expensive balloon glasses of gin and big fashionably expensive square glossy paper bags from fashionably expensive boutiques. At least no one is wearing a fucking 'gilet'.
We huff and puff. Carey can't quite get his foot on the ball. Bowler has a couple of foreys. Fiorini looks most likely but his flick knife is blunt and his two shots on goal are poor, one scuffed into the arms of the keeper the other wellied over the top. I stifle a yawn. The clock moves slowly. This is a double period of science at school of a half. Connolly provides a bit of cheer by putting in a tackle or two. Williams doesn't look especially good or especially bad. He certainly hasn't shown that sheen that occasionally a high class loan can bring yet. Gordon is really good for them, except he keeps falling over for no reason. Dele Alli has one moment where he runs at us and it looks like we can do absolutely nothing about it. He looks world class for a second or so, until he over-complicates it and then tries to buy a foul which the referee just laughs at and gives the other way.
This is boring as fuck. Here's Bowler though. He's anything but boring. He goes, he glides, he's unstoppable. He's smacking it... It's saved. It's in the air. It's Gary Madine!!! He's missed it? No he hasn't. He's headed it home. I think. Has he? He has! It's a total playground finish but who gives a fuck. It's a Gary goal!
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We've looked really vulnerable down the flanks and the attacking endeavour has been minimal. It's hard to work out what exactly the formation is, but despite there being quite a few theoretically exciting players on the pitch, the reality has been, we've really not got forward very well. I'm not sure if it's our own ambition limiting us, or Everton just being well drilled. Boring Frank and 'well drilled' aren't really a set of phrases you put together, so I'm inclined to think we've just not really clicked with whatever it is we've been asked to do.
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We're looking loads better. It's always more fun when they kick towards you and a few minutes in, I've enjoyed this half a lot more. We're creating pressure. Everton break and score again. Of course they do. Again, it all seems really easy. Hmmm.
We're not bowed by that though and pressure leads to a corner. Luke Garbutt puts in a lovely delivery and Callum Connolly sneaks towards the near post and glances home. Yes! I always said Garbs was great!
We then have a really good spell. We put the Toffees under a lot of pressure, dragging them around with some smart movement and showing a desire to pick up the ball, move it forward and get beyond each other to make an attacking option. I really enjoy this spell of the game. We come close a few times, the most notable being a stunning curler from Bowler that Pickford saves wrong handed, diving beyond, but chucking his trailing arm up and showing remarkable strength to turn it over and a corner where Keogh darts with a surprising turn of pace to the near post and is an eyebrow away from getting a glance on it that would surely turn it home. We have to remain off the pitch for another week...
The pressure doesn't tell though and Everton leg it up the other end and score another goal from their right hand side. This one, hard as it is to tell from the other end, seems to be stabbed home in front of Grimshaw from a fairly routine ball through albeit after a delicious lofted first time pass from one of them on the halfway line caught us flat footed.
Keogh goes off after feeling a bit of discomfort. We bring on Jack Moore, Thorniley, Jerry, Shayne and Rob Apter over the next few minutes. We play quite well still. Moore looks ok. He looks small though. Apter looks like he's a bit more physically ready and he's does his best to get us going in his brief cameo, creating a good moment purely by being direct, where even though he scuffs the final action, the ball breaks kindly and we seem to be through for a second.
I'm distracted at the end by a mad lad in a luminous body warmer who seems to want to offer first Pickford, then the entire North Stand out for a fight which is a strange but somewhat diverting sideshow. At least he wasn't doing heart gestures at us in his body warmer. We have some free kicks we don't do very well with and an effort from Fiorini which curls, but way too late and is always going wide. The ref plays an extra 30 seconds to let us take a corner. Nowt comes of it.
Time is up.
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Overall, I enjoyed some of how we played - I liked the second half desire to get at Everton and we were probably the better side. We were so far the inferior side in the first half and some of the defending looked so flimsy that it's difficult to complain about the result. It's a joy to watch a side with players in the middle of the park that want to go forward. It's less of a joy watching a side who don't appear to really have a left hand flank. Garbs is the only option at the moment defensively and Keshi seems the best fit in the current squad, but neither of them excelled.
It's an interesting spectacle, watching Appleton trying to impose a different mentality. Critchley's pragmatic ethos suited our squad. Results tell that story. It did, however, leave us wondering about the little flashes of exciting football we saw. Could these players be more? Was Critchley too cautious? On this evidence, I don't know. For a start, preseason is where fools rush to make judgements based on deeply flawed evidence but if I'm going to stupidly join that rush, I'd say we've sacrificed the defensive solidity and not really yet compensated by finding a natural looking attacking fluidity. I'm all for scoring one more than them, it just feels a bit like we might be in danger of scoring one fewer than them...
Gary Goals Goal Machine Madine showed a couple of moments of sublime skill (to compliment the bundled home goal) but playing with his back to goal is his strength. It felt to me as if we really needed someone playing facing the other way making the ball for the midfielders, opening space in front of them by dragging players out the way. Either that, or we need to be bolder getting midfielders forward or wide players tucked into a front 3. Lavery feels the natural fit for that forward aggressive runner, but he again came on wide, where, to be fair, he showed his waspish side for a few minutes and seemed to add to the attacking threat though I'm sceptical about his all round game being good enough to play there.
It's idiocy to read to much into kickabout football though and idiocy to read too much into the opinion of a shite blogger.
Onwards.
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