Sean Dyche has been speaking about Armando Broja and set-pieces ahead of Everton's trip to Arsenal
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Armando Broja is determined to prove he can make it as a Premier League striker at Everton following his disappointment with Chelsea, reckons Sean Dyche. The Slough-born player has been with the west London outfit since the age of seven.
But after being farmed out to Vitesse, Southampton and Fulham, Broja was loaned out again on the final day of the summer transfer window, joining the Blues for the season with an option for a permanent deal.
After recovering from an Achilles injury, the Albania international came off the bench at Goodison Park on December 4 to make his Everton debut as a substitute in the final seven minutes of their 4-0 victory over Wolverhampton Wanderers.
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Asked what the 23-year-old can bring to his side, Dyche reckons Broja has something of a 'secret weapon' and said: “He has a physicality and presence about him. He is a good size and a good mover, quicker than most people think. He has an edge to his game.
“He wants to show what he is all about, that’s what my gut feeling is with him. He is thinking it didn’t work quite how he wanted at Chelsea, but can he do it here?”
The Blues boss added: “It’s still relatively early in his career, certainly in his Premier League career. He’s had bibs and bobs, loans and stuff like that, but it’s still relatively early so wait and see.
“He’s another one who’s finding his way, finding his strengths, the things that he needs to work on, the things that he can naturally use and then learning the game, learning it tactically, and developing that side of things.
“It’s too early for me to give you an exact answer because he’s been injured for a while and we haven’t worked with him close.
“Obviously, when you’re coming out of injury, you’re not going to bombard him with stuff about this, that and the other when they’re just getting themselves fit.
“Now he’s over that process and now we’ll start looking into a bit more detail with him and saying, 'right, okay, we’ve noticed this, we’ve noticed that', and adding a bit more to it.
“So that’s where we’re at the moment with him in his development. From what my gut tells me and my instinct tells me from what I’m seeing, he’s got a chance to mould himself into many different things.
“Because he’s got a good presence, but he is quick, he can play, I love his hold-up play and his understanding. His defending play, like a lot of centre-forwards, needs work because in the Premier League, you’ve got to defend from the front.
“They’re all important facts of the modern striker. So he certainly can develop that side of things. But the other side of his game, some of it is natural development and let’s see where it takes him.”
Everton, who go to Arsenal today, have failed to score in their previous three away matches at Southampton, West Ham United and Manchester United. Dominic Calvert-Lewin, who has started all but one of the Blues’ 14 Premier League fixtures so far this term, has failed to find the net since the 3-2 defeat at Aston Villa on September 14.
In terms of referencing his team’s profligacy in big moments so far, Dyche said: “That is not a criticism, it is a fact. We know the xG and chances have been created. Facts are facts. We have not been as clinical as we would like, players want to be clinical.
“The in-house competition is important. With strikers it is important. It brings that edge because there is more force behind them and they are thinking: ‘If I can’t do it, other people might do it’. That’s part and parcel of top-level performing in football.
“We have not had that so often where we have everyone fit. We are just getting there now so let’s see, without tempting fate. That striking group has got itself fit, so how much in-competition can they add?
“We will see if it sparks more clinical finishing, it may do. We have been looking at different ways to get the strikers firing and having players fit and hungry with that thirst can make a difference.”
One way that both Everton and Arsenal have been finding the net is through set-pieces with Mikel Arteta’s side leading the way in the Premier League so far this season with eight goals from dead ball situations, excluding penalties, and the Blues joint second with Aston Villa on six. Dyche maintains there will always be a place for such manoeuvres within the game but he claims he is surprised by the amount of attention that the Gunners have been receiving on the subject.
Asked if people are forgetting that Arsenal are also good from open play, the 53-year-old said: “I don’t think they are forgetting. I just think because of their strong stats on set-pieces, it just makes a story. I certainly haven’t forgotten, they have some very good players without a doubt, and they can still open you up and find ways of winning.
“I certainly don’t think they are set-play team, they are just a team that can add that in, and they have done that. Now of course as we know full well, they are being questioned about the other side.
“How come they are not doing this, how come they are not doing that. It’s a never-ending task as a football manager it seems.”
Dyche added: “Delivery and attacking the ball, will never go out. Brian Clough was talking about that in 1987 when I first went to Nottingham Forest.
“Put the ball in the box and someone has got to go in and attack it. So that will never change.
“But the delivery improves, the movement improves, the physical power of players improves, their jump capability improves. But that is one thing that isn’t going to change, the effect of the pass and the effect of attacking, just the sheer body language and will, desire, to score a goal.”
Although Dyche’s teams have long been renowned for their own set-piece prowess, he acknowledges that any credit should go to his assistant manager Ian Woan and first-team coach Steve Stone. He said: “You probably lay down some foundations in pre-season. Certainly I do, and then you detail it down building into the season.
“Then it would be flexible because of what happens if, as in our case, you constantly get injuries so if you’re missing two, three, maybe four players at a time, it has to be flexible enough to use other players for their different ways of operating. Then your knowledge and analysis, we have a good analysis team here, I mentioned them the other week, they do a lot of background looking at stats, facts and chances, who moves where and all the different patterns.
“The staff are very good at it. I make clear, I don’t do that, I leave it to them, I have worked with them long enough to know they don’t need me looking over their shoulder.
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“They know what they are doing, they have delivered. So massive respect to them. Woany, Stoney and the analysts team. They have been doing it before we were here and since we were here and the stats have been pretty strong.
“You’ve got to look at the opposition and their analysis (of taking set-pieces), and the chance to break down the opposition. I don’t mind all these breakthrough stories but at the end of the day it’s being going a long time.
“Don’t ever think we weren’t doing all this at Burnley, because we were. Every team is doing it.”