Everton built-up a nine-match unbeaten run in the Premier League before the first international break of the calendar year but now they are preparing for the season’s run-in. After the feast of February fixtures (six) and famine in March (two), there has been a two-and-a-half week break before David Moyes’ side gear up for the final two months of the campaign.
Here’s a look at what tasks could be on the Blues boss’ to-do list for what’s left of 2024/25.
Related Articles Artist Andy Brown with his painting of Goodison Park 'I couldn’t stop shaking' - Stadium artist's hand was trembling as he met Everton icon
I never told anyone what Everton manager did for me after I refused to go on open top bus
Secure Everton’s Premier League status
It might seem obvious, but this is the immediate job that Moyes, the manager who steered Everton to nine top-eight finishes, including a club record Premier League placing of fourth in 2004/05, was brought in to do remains the same – secure Everton’s Premier League status ahead of the historic switch from Goodison Park to the new stadium.
Nobody wanted to swap partners during ‘The Last Dance’ with the Grand Old Lady, but after the team picked up just 17 points in the first half of this pivotal season under Sean Dyche (less than 50% of their total in 2022/23, which was the lowest ever equivalent total as they avoided a first relegation in 72 years by a single goal on the final day), new owners The Friedkin Group felt compelled to act.
Their bold call has been truly vindicated though. When Moyes arrived, the Blues were just a point above the drop zone but after taking just 10 games to match Dyche’s haul, Moyes’ men are now 17 points clear of the bottom three with twice as many points as Ipswich Town and Leicester City.
Many others, including over 35,000 Evertonians at test events, and the likes of Moyes’ former goalkeeper Tim Howard, and late chairman Bill Kenwright’s partner Jenny Seagrove, have now all paid a visit to the new stadium. However, taking a professional and admirable stance, the Glaswegian gaffer has refused to step foot inside the club’s 52,888 capacity future home until he’s mathematically secured Everton’s Premier League status for when they move in.
Avoid any April showers
On paper, the fixture list for Everton in April appears to be a testing one. However, similar sentiments were expressed about December, and as welling as thrashing Wolverhampton Wanderers 4-0 in what was their biggest win of the season so far, the Blues picked up some hard-fought draws against Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester City.
Everton face each of that latter trio again next month, with Mikel Arteta’s troops and Pep Guardiola’s side providing the opposition for half of Goodison Park’s four remaining matches. April ends with a trip to Stamford Bridge, a ground where Moyes once triumphed on penalties with the Blues in an FA Cup replay, but it’s also the venue where the club have endured the longest wait for a Premier League win, going back over 30 years to the 1-0 success from a Paul Rideout goal in Joe Royle’s first away game in charge on November 26, 1994.
For all Moyes’ relative success in his lengthy first spell in charge of Everton, much was made of the fact that he failed to pick up three points in any of his trips to Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester United or Liverpool. It’s Anfield, where a cheeky bookmaker once erected a mock statue of him “For services to Liverpool Football Club,” where the 61-year-old goes next.
The Blues haven’t won there in front of fans since 1999. Can they put a spoke in the wheel to delay the Reds’ title party?
Getting injured stars back on the pitch
Moyes’ current nine-match unbeaten run in the Premier League is all the more impressive given the number of players who have been out injured. As well as on-loan midfielder Orel Mangala, who was ruled out for the remainder of the season after hobbling off at the Amex Stadium with an anterior cruciate ligament injury, as Everton held out with 10 men for a 1-0 win over Brighton & Hove Albion, the Blues have been without first-choice striker Dominic Calvert-Lewin since their trip to the Sussex coast on January 25.
Armando Broja and Youssef Chermiti both came off the bench in the 1-1 draw with West Ham United last time out to play their first games under Moyes, but he’s still waiting on Dwight McNeil, who hasn’t featured since the 4-0 thrashing of Wolverhampton Wanderers on December 4, and top scorer Iliman Ndiaye, out since he hobbled off midway through the first half of Goodison’s final Merseyside Derby on February 12. Both were photographed back in training with their team-mates this week at Finch Farm so could the cavalry now be coming over the horizon?
Continue Branthwaite’s progress
After a couple of derisory offers for Jarrad Branthwaite from Manchester United were rejected out of hand by Everton last summer, it felt like the (Red) devil was finding work for idle hands during the international break as what seemed like a mischief-making story emerged that the 22-year-old was supposedly set to consider his Blues future after being overlooked for new manager Thomas Tuchel’s first England squad. Such theories don’t stack up though when you consider that goalkeeper Jordan Pickford, who plays just a few yards behind Branthwaite at club level, has won all 75 of his caps for the Three Lions while at Everton and the German’s starting XI didn’t included any players from Liverpool or either Manchester club.
After the snub for ‘The Carlisle Kaiser,’ Moyes was asked about his thoughts on the matter and said: “He doesn’t need picking up because he’s a young centre-half at the moment. If you think of centre-halves, a lot of them play and go on for a long time, so he’s at a very early stage of his career, even to be a full international.
“You’ve got to learn your trade, you’ve got to keep working at it, keep on improving. I told him: ‘Go and play really well for the Under-21s and show Thomas that he should have taken you into the squad.’”
Indeed, having brought in the likes of Joleon Lescott and Phil Jagielka in his previous stint as Blues boss – as well as signing John Stones as his parting gift – Moyes enjoys an arguably unrivalled reputation when it comes to developing young centre-backs into England internationals. Branthwaite should heed his own words from earlier this month when, ahead of Junior Fan Day, he told youngsters he was looking forwards to playing for Everton in their new stadium.
Given the £80million fee that Manchester United paid for Harry Maguire in 2019, the £75million Chelsea paid for Wesley Fofana in 2022 and the £77million Manchester City paid for Josko Gvardiol in 2023, Goodison Park chiefs considered Branthwaite to be in the same bracket ahead of the current campaign.
But if he can continue his trajectory with what will hopefully be an upwardly mobile Everton side playing in front of the biggest regular crowds in the club’s history next season under Moyes, then the Scot, who moulded Declan Rice at West Ham United into one of the two England players to command a £100million plus transfer tag, might have a third nine-figure superstar on his hands.