Chelsea loss won’t dampen Everton’s recovery after years in doldrums

It is now 350 days since Neal Maupay, still an Everton player, tweeted: “Whenever I’m having a bad day, I just check the Everton score and smile” after a dire 2-0 home loss to Nottingham Forest. Sean Dyche was relieved of his duties two weeks later, hours before an FA Cup third round tie against Peterborough, leaving the club two points from Premier League safety.

Relegation was realistic, the inevitable product of five years of managed decline and entrenched incompetence and apathy, constant belt-tightening yet constant waste. Their three previous seasons had ended in 15th, 17th and 16th, and they last reached 60 points in 2017. Everton were increasingly uncomfortable in a fragile mediocrity, but had little other choice until their takeover was confirmed last December.

Almost a year on, Maupay has played one Ligue 1 minute for Marseille this season and has been banished from first-team training. Meanwhile Everton are in the Premier League’s top half and have won four of their past six games, including four clean sheets.

But perhaps the greatest development is that being an Everton fan is fun again. There is enough stability to breathe and take in the new surroundings. Even in defeat, Jack Grealish strutted around Stamford Bridge, collar popped and calves popping, comfortable once more at a level and in an environment he should never have left, a delicate idol in need of reverence and worship, of sufficient freedom and love. Some big fish are never supposed to leave their ponds.

Iliman Ndiaye and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, the other members of the “Holy Shinity” – a nod to the “Holy Trinity” of Alan Ball, Colin Harvey and Howard Kendall, coined because they all play with low-slung socks – are both in the best form of their careers, although Dewsbury-Hall limped off after 15 minutes here at Stamford Bridge.

It would be easy to conflate this aestheticism and entertainment with brilliant attacking execution, which is not the case – only four clubs have scored fewer goals than Everton this season, and only Burnley, Sunderland and Wolves have taken fewer shots on target. But Moyes will be happy to hide behind the fantasy his magicians are weaving, reminded of the lesson he should have taken from his time at West Ham: as a mid-table club, engaging the fans will give you more rope than drawing a few more games 1-1 every season.

Only Pep Guardiola, Mikel Arteta, Oliver Glasner and Moyes have sufficient power within their clubs to have the official title of manager, with Moyes maintaining a day-to-day influence over recruitment. He has long admired Dewsbury-Hall and attempted to sign him on loan in January, within days of taking over. Everything that West Ham have endured since his departure is vindication of his standing as a Premier League great by any metric, as does Everton’s sudden stabilisation since he rejoined. There have been few coaches ever more adept at maximising the resources of a mid-table establishment.

And there are obvious areas for easy growth here. Everton’s starting lineup at Stamford Bridge included five players of 30 or older, a consequence of inconsistent youth recruitment and talent development. Vitaliy Mykolenko – embarrassed by Pedro Neto for Chelsea’s second – Idrissa Gueye and Michael Keane’s contracts all expire next June. James Tarkowski and Keane are, God love them, not a sustainable Premier League centre-back partnership in 2025. Since August 2023, they have conceded 1.6 goals per game in 27 matches when starting together, while that figure drops to just 1.1 goals per game in the 64 matches without them.

Jarrad Branthwaite, still only 23 and prodigiously gifted, has not played since 18 May but has returned to full training. Jake O’Brien, condemned to lumber up and down the right flank on Saturday, will look more comfortable when returned to his natural central berth. Despite Thierno Barry’s first goal in 15 Premier League appearances against Nottingham Forest last weekend, the club’s post-Romelu Lukaku quest for a reliable striker continues apace, a crucial next step given the creative power now at Moyes’ disposal.

For all their recent ghostbusting – this season Everton have earned their first away win at Bournemouth ever and their first victory at Old Trafford since December 2013, this was never likely to be the club’s greatest day – Everton have not won at Stamford Bridge since 1994, and Moyes has never won here either. Even so, Ndiaye and Grealish both had decent opportunities to claim a point in the fading moments of an eerily flat match, Chelsea fans seemingly waiting for a burst of energy which never quite came.

“This club should be challenging for Europe or be in Europe,” Moyes said on Wednesday. “But I think people need to give us time and understand how bad it’s been in the past few years. I’m going for it and so are the players. Our aim is to try to do that.”

There has been a sense that Everton have failed to take advantage of the Premier League’s most recent financial boom, first spending dreadfully, then not at all. Cenk Tosun might have been forgettable, but the £27.5m spent on him should not be. Their 2023-24 revenue was lower than Crystal Palace and Brighton’s, although their new stadium should allow them to rapidly bridge that gap and begin more permanently catching clubs of a similar historical stature in Aston Villa and Newcastle. Creating the headroom to allow Moyes and his recruitment team to spend is an obvious priority given the Squad Cost Ratio being implemented next summer is directly tied to revenue. Everton know more than most the emotional and physical cost of breaching financial rules.

This is the first season of a renewed club in so many ways, from the stadium and ownership to a new-look playing corps and shiny new vibe as a care home for budding cult heroes in need of love and attention. Progress will not be linear and serious, intelligent investment is non-negotiable. But even if the Hill Dickinson lost its booing virginity after the 1-1 draw with West Ham in September, there are plenty of days to come where Everton fans can check the score and smile.

Photograph by Chris Lee – Chelsea FC/Chelsea FC via Getty Images