Not The 'Right Man At The Right Time', Just The Right Man
Why Sean Dyche should be allowed to lead Everton into a new era.
When Sean Dyche walked into Everton’s Finch Farm training ground as their new manager on 30th January 2023, he was walking into a club mired in chaos. Several years of mismanagement in the era of Farhad Moshiri’s ownership had caught up with the club over the previous two seasons, and the quickfire hiring and firings of Rafa Benitez and Frank Lampard had left the club in their second consecutive relegation scrap, and in the bottom three.
Amid fan unrest and protest, the club’s board had seemingly checked out, leaving the club rudderless and without hope.
It says much about the level of disorganization at Everton that, just as the club didn’t officially announce Lampard’s sacking until a couple of days after everyone knew he was gone, Dyche had already been seen driving in and out of Finch Farm several times before it was officially announced by the club. Poor communication aside, the appointment was the one sensible decision the club had made in years.
After Abdoulaye Doucoure’s volley at home to Bournemouth on the final day ensured survival, Dyche was quick to point out that survival alone was nothing to celebrate.
With fans and manager alike yearning for a straightforward, stable season, the chaos that surrounded Dyche’s first months at the cub would quickly come to resemble a warped honeymoon period.
If he had been brought in as a ‘firefighter’, Dyche was then forced to watch after further blazes broke out in every corner, and effectively asked to douse the flames with the taps turned off, as financial necessity ensured that a squad already desperately short of both depth and quality was further stripped bare.
Early signs were mixed, with frustrating results, especially at home, leaving the team without a win until late September, despite a high number of chances created. But there was enough to suggest that once those chances started going in, there was enough to survive.
Then came the season-defining bombshell.
The unprecedented 10 points for breaching profit and sustainability rules plunged the club into the bottom three, yet appeared to provide Dyche with the necessary motivation he needed to drive the players on, and a run of four wins without conceding a single goal followed.
The new year didn’t follow suit, however, and a four-win run was followed by thirteen games without victory. A second two-point deduction, as well as ongoing uncertainty around the club’s ownership, with 777 Partners’ attempted takeover hitting snag after snag, was clearly taking its toll on the players, as were the physical demands of being part of such a threadbare squad.
Panic set in for many fans as the winless run became record breakingly bad. Even Mike Walker, previously the benchmark for bad Everton managers, didn’t have a run as bad as this. But Walker, as well as Benitez and Lampard, never had to contend with what Dyche did this season.
I won’t pretend I was never worried, of course I was. The defeat away to Bournemouth in particular gave cause for angst, but at no point did I feel like I had during the past two seasons. I always felt Dyche would keep us safe, whereas under both Benitez and Lampard, I never felt that way. In Lampard’s first half season, it was the fans that kept us up. This season, while the fans played a huge part once more, it was the manager.
There is no doubt in my mind that with anyone other than Sean Dyche at the helm, Everton would have sunk like a stone after our first points deduction, never mind after a second.
With relegation now a mathematical impossibility, and with the manager’s contract about to enter its final year, talk has turned to whether he is the right man to take us forward. Personally, I find it absolutely baffling that this is even open to debate.
One common criticism from fans, even those who acknowledge what he’s done, is that Dyche’s supposed style ‘isn’t for them’. That they want to see ‘good football’. So what exactly constitutes good football? Because I seem to remember some of these same fans having collective heart attacks at the sight of John Stones trying to play out from the back under Roberto Martinez.
Marco Silva’s possession-based game brought some superb wins, but I also recall it receiving actual boo’s when the team had clearly been instructed to keep the ball and run down the clock in a game they were winning comfortably.
Admittedly, Martinez and Silva may not be the best examples of coaches who play ‘good football’ as both were hugely flawed, but I think it begs the question; in an Everton context, what is good football?
Leaving aside the fact that at the moment, anything that keeps us away from the bottom three is perhaps the best we can realistically hope for, think of the best Everton teams of modern times. What did these teams look like?
Going back to the great side of the 1980’s, we had incredibly talented players like Trevor Steven, Kevin Sheedy and the criminally underrated midfield genius that was Paul Bracewell. But even these players worked hard and could scrap when they needed to, and the team was built on a solid and aggressive defence, as well as a smattering of genuine nastiness. Peter Reid could play, but he was also an absolute little bull terrier who must have been a nightmare to play against, and Pat Van Den Hauwe wasn’t called Psycho for nothing.
Our last side to win a trophy was known as the Dogs Of War, and the direct, in-your-face brand of play Joe Royle instilled in them was good enough to win the FA Cup in 1995. Barry Horne, John Ebbrell and Joe Parkinson in midfield summed up the kind of commitment needed for a team like that, although Parkinson in particular was another underrated player, and their work rate was supplemented by flair of Anders Limpar, and Andy Hinchliffe’s delivery from both open play and set pieces.
When David Moyes came to the club, his early sides followed a similar blueprint, with being committed, hardworking and hard to beat the first requirement, to which he gradually added quality over the years. In later years, that quality was there to be seen in most areas of the team, with the likes of Baines, Pienaar, Arteta and Fellaini often playing genuinely good football, but never at the expense of being a distinctly Everton team.
Of our last long line of coaches, whose style of play and management fits in best with this tradition?
Another frequent, and entirely justified, complaint is that Goodison has become too easy a place to visit in the post-Moyes years, and the need to once again turn Goodison into a fortress and a ‘bearpit’ has been highlighted. I 100% agree with this, but question whether tiki-taka is the right kind of football to generate such an atmosphere. What happens on the pitch dictates the mood on the terraces, and is it any coincidence that the decline of the ‘Goodison roar’ correlates with the appointment of aesthetes as coaches?
Is it possible that Everton need to get back to doing what they do best, playing into and harnessing the strengths and characteristics of both club and fans?
Goodison can be a nasty place at times, with that nastiness often aimed at our own players. I am now fully committed to the notion that the best way to harness that nastiness is to lean into the style of football that Dyche would deploy.
And I’m not talking about playing route one hoofball here, just direct football. And yes, there absolutely is a difference between aimlessly punting it upfield and always looking to play forward quickly, either on the floor or in the air. ‘Droit a but’, as they say in Marseille.
As much as I’m a fan of the Ajax and Dutch national teams’ total football of the 1970’s, and of the Iniesta, Xavi and Messi-driven style of Guardiola’s Barca, I also believe there is no greater sight than that of an Everton number nine getting their head on the end of a cross, except perhaps that of an Everton defender crunching into a tackle. I’m not saying I want to see yard dogs who can’t pass the ball, and I’m as desperate as anyone for more quality to be added to the squad, but it’s not only a question of which style is most realistically attainable, it’s also a question of which is more likely to elicit the kind of intimidating atmosphere we have been lacking for several years, and I believe that it’s the brand of football that Dyche is known for.
We’ve tried to play open, ‘attractive’ football under Martinez, Silva and Lampard, and where has it got us? I think the pervading modern football fan’s demand for teams to play a certain way is tiresome and in Everton’s case has caused something of an identity crisis within the fanbase. Particularly, and at risk of sounding like an out-of-touch, grumpy arlarse, among the younger fans who’ve never witnessed a successful (by whichever metric you choose to measure the word) Everton side, and who have only really seen a certain style of football winning trophies.
Last week was a perfect summary of what a Dyche-led Everton could be. Wednesday night in the derby, they gave everything you would hope an Everton team would. They were aggressive, motivated and tactically astute. On Saturday against Brentford, they played the game that needed to be played, and saw out the kind of routine 1-0 win we seem to have forgotten how to execute, and yet some were still not satisfied.
Those calling for the manager’s dismissal during what was an undeniably grim run of results can be forgiven for what in many cases was driven purely by fear and panic, but any Evertonian still advocating for the sacking of the manager who has kept us safe under these circumstances needs to take a long look at themselves. To do so would be ungrateful, classless and, worst of all, Koppite behaviour.
With safety now guaranteed, many who were calling for Dyche’s sacking a few weeks ago are now graciously accepting that he should be permitted to see out the final season of his contract, and the final season at Goodison. How very generous of them. Even within this consensus, however, a popular view seems to be that the move into the new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock should be heralded by a new coach to take us into a new era. Shiny new stadium, shiny new coach playing nice shiny football seems to be the thinking.
The hope is the stadium will buck the trend of most modern stadia by still being able to generate an atmosphere befitting the club. Architect Dan Meis consulted intensely with fans on what they wanted, and has been at pains to give the place a distinct feel. Whether he has been successful in that remains to be seen, but if fans hope to retain the club’s integrity and identity, and not turn into a tourist club (an accusation often aimed at Liverpool), then transferring that Goodison roar to the city’s waterfront will be essential, and therefore continuity and stability will be needed then as much as now, and Dyche should be placed right at the heart of that.
Once the ownership is sorted, one way or the other, whoever comes in, they should not only let Dyche complete his contract, but should extend it. Give him two years. Two years, against a backdrop that doesn’t resemble a natural disaster, where he can focus on just football, and where he can spend just a bit of money- which he will also do astutely. Give him two years of stability, and I strongly believe that Everton Football Club will be in a far healthier place than it has been for what feels like a very long time.
I said when he was appointed that there had been a certain inevitability about Dyche becoming Everton manager since he was frequenting Cream nightclub in his youth. I had felt for a while that he just seems to fit. He’s not the right man at the right time as some of his critics have grudgingly claimed, he’s just the right man.
He has more than earned the right to prove himself under normal circumstances at Everton, and if he isn’t allowed to do so, then history will never be able to judge him fairly, but it should certainly judge Everton harshly.