For the second year in a row, Everton have maintained their perfect Premier League status by the skin of their teeth, and once again the Goodison Park roar was enough to get them to scramble over the line.
Abdoulaye Doucoure’s piledriver against AFC Bournemouth on Sunday, as well as some heroics from goalkeeper Jordan Pickford, got the Toffees out of their sticky situation with the most valuable of three points to keep them in the top flight.
The full-time scenes which involved fans spilling onto the pitch, viewed as a celebration of mediocrity, was anything but. The supporters were showing their relief after once again avoiding relegation to the second tier.
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The fans were heard chanting ‘sack the board’ after the full-time whistle because ultimately the state of regression that has been happening at Everton over the past few years stems from the incompetence of those at the top who have financially mismanaged the club. The fan base have long come to the end of their tether with the likes of chairman Bill Kenwright and CEO Denise Barrett-Baxendale, whose poor decisions have seen Everton fall behind their Premier League rivals.
Everton posted losses for the fifth consecutive year back in March and they were pulled up by the Premier League, who referred them to an independent commission for an alleged breach of Profitability and Sustainability rules. The Toffees have lost £430 million during this period and Premier League rules state that a club can lose no more than £105 million over a three year period.
Owner Farhad Moshiri has taken a lot of criticism from fans for the mess he has put the club in. Despite spending hundreds of millions of pounds on players, the quality of the investment has not been good enough.
Manager Sean Dyche has done an incredible job to guide them to safety in the latest campaign. Had the former Burnley boss been unable to keep Everton up, the consequences could have been severe.
The club’s accounts would have been thrown into further disarray with the Premier League funding being pulled. Of course they would get three years worth of parachute payments but it wouldn’t be enough. Then there is the development of the new stadium at Bramley-Moore dock which is reportedly costing £500 million to build. Who knows what would have happened with that project had the Toffees sunk into the Championship?
It is clear that change is desperately needed at Goodison Park, and it can’t come soon enough. They cannot afford to keep losing money at the rate they currently are. The change that is needed has got to stem from the top too. There have been rumours swirling in recent weeks that Moshiri is talking to potential investors, MSP Sports Capital, about buying into the club, which could be a huge sign of progress.
There is no faith and trust in the board from the supporters, so it seems like it is only a matter of time before there is a mass shake-up there. Everton need fresh ideas at the top to generate new streams of revenue to help the club overturn its losses and become a profitable business which in turn can help lead to a successful team on the pitch.
Under the current regime, for now at least, the threat of relegation will loom over the Toffees every year. The mismanagement of funds has made it difficult for them to strengthen the squad.
Everton are one of English football’s most decorated and historic clubs, but it has been almost 30 years since they last won a major trophy. For far too long the blue supporting side of Merseyside have had to put up with a lot of mediocrity while having to watch rivals Liverpool continuing their own success at home and in Europe.
Everton need the platform to climb back to the glory days of old. Getting the structure right behind the scenes and on the pitch could be the springboard for a very bright future, something that the fans deserve for the rubbish that they have had to endure in recent years.
