Speaking to Keith Downie outside our Benton training base before Friday’s press conference, Howe perfectly summed up where we are at heading into this weekend’s game.
On the Man City display and the challenges ahead, he said: “The energy was there, the quality was there – I think the mentality was there. So, the challenge for us is to find that consistently.”
Last Saturday’s 1-1 draw with the Champions was everything we wanted to see. We looked like a high-intensity, all-action, physical, organised and brave team again, delivering an encouraging response to that 3-1 defeat at Fulham and a start to the season full of patchy (if not poor) performances.
The question now is can we make that level of performance the new normal. Not just at St James’ Park and not just against one of the big boys, but away from home and when up against a side we’re expected to beat, if we turn up.
Eddie Howe’s pre-match comments
“It has been a good week. The Manchester City performance showed us what we are capable of when we are at our best. Then we had a result against AFC Wimbledon too. So, yeah, everything rests now on this game.”
“The energy that the crowd give us [to press], the feeling of if a player goes or he doesn’t, that has served us so well at home. It is different away from home. Tactically, it is about our delivery, how we implement that. It is just being effective in what we do.
“I think how you start the game (at Goodison Park) and how you impose yourselves on the opposition there is hugely important. So we want to be really positive in our approach. And we’ve got to learn lessons from the Fulham game in our last away performance. We did for the Manchester City game, but it’s still relevant in my mind that we need to to make sure we’ve learned our lessons from then.”
Team news
Alexander Isak (toe) has been ruled out again and Martin Dubravka (bruised knee) is set to miss out. In better news, Nick Pope, Kieran…
Author : Olly Hawkins
Publish date : 2024-10-04 17:42:35
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The post Everton (A) Pre-match thoughts, team news, possible line up and prediction first appeared on Foot & Soccer.
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Author : footsoccer
Publish date : 2024-10-04 17:58:26
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