Death or Glory for Everton

Article by e-Everton Correspondent Kenneth Jarvis

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So after the bitter disappointment of Wednesday we have had time to reflect and accept what was an awful defeat. Roberto Martinez is a very 'death or glory' type of manager. I think David Motes would of won that match vs Crystal Palace, as he wouldn't of taken those risks and would of put a more combative team out that wouldn't of shirked challenges and moaned to the referee under minimal contact as some of the players did. David Moyes though, wouldn't of beaten Arsenal 3-0 and played them off the park.

We are certainly better off with Martinez but if you want his style of football I think you need to accept that results like Wednesday will happen every now and again. I think his tactics all came from James Mccarthy being absent from the team, with what was said to be a small muscle injury. Everton only have 1 replacement for Barry and McCarthy and that is Darren Gibson who, after a long period out, is only just returning from injury. This meant that Ross Barkley played in that position meaning that we didn't have the defensive stability that McCarthy brings to the team, we certainly looked a lot better after he came on.

A lot of the performance absolutely stank however. Distin looked shaky, something that has been very rare in a good season. Stones, however good on the ball, was at fault for 2 of the goals. Barry seemed overwhelmed without his partner in crime. McGeady just looked plain average. Mirallas didn't seem interested in the battle and Deulofeu looked an absolute wimp, as he couldn't even be bothered to contest 60/40's let alone 50/50's. One of the main things in this match however is that Crystal Palace put away their chances and were very clinical.

We can analyze it until the cows come home but after 7 straight wins it's very difficult to criticise Martinez. People were saying that he shouldn't change a winning team but he has been rotating the team all the way through our 7 match winning streak and if James McCarthy did have a small muscle injury then Martinez' hands were tied as to what he could do. I suspect however that Martinez was just trying to rest McCarthy for Sunday.

On to Sunday then and it's time to brush ourselves off and go again. The atmosphere on Sunday may even be louder now as a win is even more important in our quest for the Champions League. Arsenal play Hull at the KC before our match and any points dropped from Arsenal there will put it back into our hands. It seemed a trademark of Martinez that his teams perform on the big stage. I said before Wednesday that I was more confident winning against Manchester United than I was Crystal Palace.

A lot of people were up in arms on social media after the defeat and I wouldn't expect anything less from passionate Evertonians. I always say you should ignore anything Evertonians say in the immediate aftermath of a defeat as we're not thinking straight!

The amazing thing is, lose our last 4 matches and we've still had the best season we've ever had in the Premier League. Martinez will get things wrong, the best managers do. The mark of a great manager is to get a lot more right than wrong and Martinez has certainly done that this season. So death or glory, on Wednesday it was death. On Sunday I expect it to be glory.

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