Everton 3-6 Chelsea
(Mirallas 45, Naismith 69, Eto'o 76: Costa 1, 90, Ivanovic 3, Coleman OG 67, Matic 74, Ramires 77)
39,402
What the hell can you do? How there are still people even after this debacle who are insistent on there being nothing wrong with Jagielka and Distin, I can only assume they are blind, or think we're playing basketball, because if the first two games werent bad enough, this is the worst defensive performance Ive ever seen from an Everton side. Summed up inside 35 seconds when Jagielka, in the middle of tracking Costa's run, just decided to try and play him offside...after the pass had been made, leaving him with an easy one on one. Next up, the first of many horrific decisions from the officials that ironically prompted Graham Poll today to call this the worst officiated game he's ever seen...he'd know of course. As just 2 minutes later, Ivanovic was left unmarked, but offside, but nothing given by Stevie Wonder running the line. He only enhanced his claim for being registered blind when he somehow missed Howard inexplicably handle the ball outside the box under pressure from Hazard as well, and the first time he did award an offside in the game (prompting the most sarcastic celebration of a decision by a crowd I think Ive ever heard!) it was wrong! Jagielka making a complete balls of playing Costa offside again as he rushed through and hit the post, but the flag had already gone up anyway. Typically, at the other end, we got the linesman who actually knew what offside was and disallowed a goal from us, Lukaku heading a corner against the bar, and Distin poking in the rebound from an offside position. Mirallas did though give us hope after a first half where we'd never looked out of it, with a lovely long distance header from Coleman's cross.
Defensively, the second half made those first 3 minutes look like a defensive instructional video. Howard made two early saves from Costa, but for the most part, it was us doing the pushing for an equaliser. And you could tell it was starting to get a bit fractious, Fabregas doing his usual and getting involved with everything and having a whinge and a niggle, and Costa getting booked for getting involved with Coleman. Just when we were looking like the only side who was going to score next, we totally undid all our good work. Hazard ran into the box under pressure from McCarthy, with the rest of the defence all just stood around in the middle of the box marking nobody and just watching him, then just our luck, Coleman blocks his cross, and it deflecting in. Costa showing his class goading Coleman, fair play to Howard who ran over and let him know about it, while our captain stood around feeling sorry for himself. We were straight back in it though, McGeady feeding the outstanding Steven Naismith who finished confidently with the outside of his right foot. We were that good and that creative going forward, there was still never a feeling we were out of it. But then that defence just kept on undoing everything we did going forward. Just 5 minutes later again, everybody just backed off and backed off Matic, allowing him to shoot, only then did anyone attempt a block, and again the deflection beat the keeper. Straight from the kick off again, we hit back immediately, debutant Samuel Eto'o with a lovely stooping header from a free kick. Only for us to again make fools ourselves with our version of marking, again backing off all the way and leaving Ramires unmarked until far too late. We nearly hit back immediately again with what would have been our goal of the season no question, a brilliant passing move saw Mirallas with an audacious improvised attempt that Courtois tipped onto the post. But no, we let the final word and the final embarassment go to the stars of the show, the Everton defence. Besic came on for his debut and got in on the act with his first touch, an obscene backheel to fucking nobody but John Obi Mikel. He played a much more sensible backheel to Costa, leaving Jagielka diving in and sprawling like a schoolboy, Costa doing the same to Distin before tucking it into the corner.
So one goal that shouldnt have stood, two deflections, and a gift, Costa and Howard should have been sent off. Thank God we can score goals. Naismith, Mirallas, Lukaku, Eto'o, McGeady, Coleman, all excellent. Naismith is on fire at the moment. He'll get injured on international duty knowing our luck. That defence though...its a season too much for Jagielka and Distin. For all those defending them saying they havent become bad overnight, its not overnight. Our defence was excellent last season, so lets not forget that a huge part of that was Jagielka getting injured and John Stones playing half a season, and now he's picking splinters out of his arse. He needs to be in the lineup right now, and get another defender in before the deadline, because they are undermining all the good stuff at the moment.
Defensively, the second half made those first 3 minutes look like a defensive instructional video. Howard made two early saves from Costa, but for the most part, it was us doing the pushing for an equaliser. And you could tell it was starting to get a bit fractious, Fabregas doing his usual and getting involved with everything and having a whinge and a niggle, and Costa getting booked for getting involved with Coleman. Just when we were looking like the only side who was going to score next, we totally undid all our good work. Hazard ran into the box under pressure from McCarthy, with the rest of the defence all just stood around in the middle of the box marking nobody and just watching him, then just our luck, Coleman blocks his cross, and it deflecting in. Costa showing his class goading Coleman, fair play to Howard who ran over and let him know about it, while our captain stood around feeling sorry for himself. We were straight back in it though, McGeady feeding the outstanding Steven Naismith who finished confidently with the outside of his right foot. We were that good and that creative going forward, there was still never a feeling we were out of it. But then that defence just kept on undoing everything we did going forward. Just 5 minutes later again, everybody just backed off and backed off Matic, allowing him to shoot, only then did anyone attempt a block, and again the deflection beat the keeper. Straight from the kick off again, we hit back immediately, debutant Samuel Eto'o with a lovely stooping header from a free kick. Only for us to again make fools ourselves with our version of marking, again backing off all the way and leaving Ramires unmarked until far too late. We nearly hit back immediately again with what would have been our goal of the season no question, a brilliant passing move saw Mirallas with an audacious improvised attempt that Courtois tipped onto the post. But no, we let the final word and the final embarassment go to the stars of the show, the Everton defence. Besic came on for his debut and got in on the act with his first touch, an obscene backheel to fucking nobody but John Obi Mikel. He played a much more sensible backheel to Costa, leaving Jagielka diving in and sprawling like a schoolboy, Costa doing the same to Distin before tucking it into the corner.
So one goal that shouldnt have stood, two deflections, and a gift, Costa and Howard should have been sent off. Thank God we can score goals. Naismith, Mirallas, Lukaku, Eto'o, McGeady, Coleman, all excellent. Naismith is on fire at the moment. He'll get injured on international duty knowing our luck. That defence though...its a season too much for Jagielka and Distin. For all those defending them saying they havent become bad overnight, its not overnight. Our defence was excellent last season, so lets not forget that a huge part of that was Jagielka getting injured and John Stones playing half a season, and now he's picking splinters out of his arse. He needs to be in the lineup right now, and get another defender in before the deadline, because they are undermining all the good stuff at the moment.
