The Fiver | Finally it seems Everton can claim the upper hand in something

As anyone who has followed football since 1892 will know, Everton have historically struggled to get one up on their fierce rivals Liverpool. For example, during the early 1960s, they were very much the Paris Saint-Germain of their day, chucking eye-watering sums of money around to land the best players available. The Mersey Millionaires duly landed the title … only for Liverpool to wrest it off them and bag another in short order. Everton began the following decade as champions of England while their neighbours were busy getting knocked out of the FA Cup by second-tier Watford … but Liverpool ended the 70s having won another four titles of their own with the Blues languishing in mid-table. And Graeme Souness suited his perm better than Bob Latchford. Then in May 2005, David Moyes led the club to fourth place in the Premier League, proudly leaving Rafael Beneath Us trailing in his wake, only for … well, perhaps they went a bit early with that particular riff.
But finally it seems Everton can claim the upper hand in something! The fact that the measurement in question is rank ineptitude may give sporting traditionalists pause for thought. Still, given the way Jürgen Klopp is currently making Roy Evans look like the parsimonious love child of George Graham and Helenio Herrera, retaining your status as the most shambolic shower on Merseyside is an achievement of sorts. Everton were battered 4-0 at Manchester United on Sunday, a defeat that comes off the back of pastings by Chelsea, Tottenham and Atalanta. They’ve conceded 12 times in those four games, while failing to score a single goal. So much for all those much-trumpeted pre-season hopes and dreams. It all leaves the grand old team in the relegation zone, alongside a club who finished 21st in League Two eight years ago, and Mr Roy.
Ronald Koeman – who, like Lawrie McMenemy, Dejan Lovren and relative success story the RMS Titanic, may be wishing he’d never left Southampton – cut a depressed figure after Sunday’s shellacking. Replying to José Mourinho’s claim that Everton are aiming for a place in the top four this season “at least”, he spluttered: “Is there anybody who sees this as realistic for Everton?!” A rhetorical question for the ages. Koeman’s mood won’t have been improved with the news that Wayne Rooney has to squeeze 100 hours of community service into his upcoming schedule, but there is light at the end of the tunnel. Fortunately for Everton, they play Sunderland in the Worthington’s Cup on Wednesday, a fine opportunity to rediscover some form before their relegation six-pointer against Bournemouth at the weekend. Also, Liverpool appear to have built their midfield around Emre Can, so getting one up on them in a more positive sense shouldn’t be ruled out quite yet.
“He’s still got it. He was named on the team-sheet but turned up late and had to come on when he arrived. He played about 40 minutes in all, having to leave early doors in the second half, and it was something ticked off my bucket list. It was a stonewall penalty and he tucked it away” – Potteries and District Sunday League vice-suit Mick Mallin’s dreams come true as he watches Ricardo Fuller’s goal-scoring cameo for second division side Grange Park Rangers, which involved some top, top ambling about up front before slotting home a spot-kick and doing one early to watch his son play elsewhere.
Football Weekly will be all up in your ear canals shortly, with Max Rushden joined by Barry Glendenning, Philippe Auclair and pod debutant Jacqui Oatley.
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“Is there any validity to the idea that Big Vase, with its ‘unattractive matches’, perhaps shouldn’t exist at all? Given that there’s already another, better competition involving, in the qualifying stages, some 78 teams, there’s no need for one spanning nearly the entire year, involving massive amounts of travel, etc, which is eventually won by the only team that can be bothered or one so replete with resources that it can beat everyone else purely on muscle memory? Just going out on a limb here” – Christopher Smith.
“About Arsenal’s season tickets working out to about £47 a match (Friday’s Fiver), that’s about $64 here in the USA! USA!! USA!!! For a comparison, the cheapest ticket for the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden is $75, for the New York Giants they’re maybe $150 if you can get them, and while you can get into Yankee Stadium for a baseball game for $17, if you want to see anything, it’s at least $60. That said, I was able to see the then-woeful Washington Wizards play Detroit a few years back for $5, which was a very fair price given their ineptitude” – Jerry Slaff.
“In Friday’s Fiver letters, Kevin McKee asked if there were any readers with footballing names. Well, no I don’t, but this tale does have a tenuous link to The Fiver. I have a namesake who is an Australian TV producer most famous for his collaboration with now-deceased Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin whose cries of ‘crikey’ when coming face to face with a venomous snake became popular in the late 1990s. In a demonstration of researching skills that I can only assume The Fiver adopted as a role model, a US TV news channel based in Texas emailed me out of the blue and asked if I would like to be interviewed on TV to talk about Steve and why his shows were such big hits with US audiences. I was quite keen until I learnt they meant a telephone interview, not an all-expenses-paid trip to Dallas. The TV channel were quite keen until they realised I had stuff all to do with Steve and the show” – John Stainton (not that one).
“May I be the first of the 1,057 to point out that when a club is forced to give away expensive shirts because of the misspelling of the club’s name on said shirt, any tea-timely missive should check and double check the spelling before mentioning the misspelling (Friday’s Quote of the Day) in some superior ‘ha, we could never have done such a thing’ way. Because, dear Fiver, there is only one e in Montpellier” – Phillipa Suarez (and no others).
Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet The Fiver. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is … John Stainton.
Everton striker Wayne Rooney has pleaded guilty and expressed remorse for drink-driving after an evening out in Alderley Edge. “Following today’s court hearing I want publicly to apologise for my unforgivable lack of judgment in driving while [three times] over the legal limit. It was completely wrong,” he said.
Paddy Power has said sorry again, this time for listing odds of 66-1 on the late Ugo Ehiogu being named Birmingham boss. “This was a genuine error. A trader re-used an old market as a template for this one, and didn’t notice that Mr Ehiogu was included,” parped a statement. “Obviously that was a mistake, one which was rectified as soon as it was spotted, within minutes.”
Ousmane Dembélé will have plenty of time to talk about his £130m price tag with Barcelona medical bods after thigh-knack ruled him out for four months.
Jake Livermore has told West Brom fans who wondered why he didn’t play in the scintillating 0-0 draw with West Ham not to worry. “The club made the decision it was the right and only time to take a few days off to rest my body,” he said. “All is good in the Livermore household, but thanks for those who showed concerns.”
Liverpool-bound Naby Keïta has been given a three-match ban after getting his Sadio Mané on in Christoph Kramer’s face during Leipzig’s 2-2 draw with Mönchengladbach.
Ersatz Crystal Palace tribute act Alavés have fired coach Luis Zubeldía after the 3-0 loss at Villarreal left them winless, pointless and without a goal in four games. “Alavés has decided to stop the coach after the results obtained in the beginning of the season,” blabbed a club suit.
And England manager Mark Sampson is confident the allegations made against him will not disrupt his players’ focus on their World Cup qualifier against Russia on Tuesday. “I’m working with a strong group of women who understand what they need to do to be at their best,” he tooted.
Sign up and receive the best of Big Website’s coverage, every Friday, it says here. Seems to be a curious lack of mentions for The Fiver …
Manchester being mad for goals is just one of 10 talking points from the weekend’s Premier League action. Read them here. Or here. Or even right over …………… here!

Sid Lowe ventured to the outskirts of Madrid on Saturday night. Why? Because he watched Atlético’s first match at the Wanda Metropolitano, the club’s new stadium that sounds like a 1980s nightspot popular with yuppies in Reading. Read what he made of it.

Sixteen-year-old Pietro Pellegri made his dad cry at the weekend – but not because he told him to eff off after being grounded for smoking special cigs. No, they were tears of joy and pride after the Genoa striker became the youngest scorer in Serie A history against Lazio.
Cologne fans are feeling a lot less chipper than they were last week when they turned up on every street corner in London – and with good reason. They watched their team get hammered 5-0 by Dortmund as well as being on the receiving end of a dire video refereeing decision.

Meet Malcom, the other Brazilian forward who is setting Ligue 1 alight but not in the middle alas, write French football aficionados Adam White and Eric Devin.
Birmingham have pressed the big red panic button and sent ‘Arry Redknapp on a one-way trip to the Hotel Do One after being roundly beaten by Preston, a club who could teach them a thing or two about stability, writes Nick Miler.
The FA has donned its lab coat and injected a healthy dose of futsal into English football’s DNA in the hope it will lead to the national team winning something while the world is still spinning. Jamie Fahey has the details.
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SOURCE : GUARDIAN SPORTS
posted by CAMPUS94