Derek Kennington is providing this week’s View from the Gwladys .
Derek is a lifelong Evertonian and is keen to see his beloved Everton lift silverware in the none-too-distant future.
He discusses Marco Silva’s reign, manager pressure, Gylfi Sigurdsson’s form and what would be a successful season as well how to cure the set-piece problems running through Goodison Park at the moment.
For those who are keen to take part in future editions of View from the Gwladys, e-mail: sam.carroll@trinitymirror.com.
You can follow Derek Kennington on Twitter @justdezza87 .
A lot of fans are growing frustrated with Marco Silva. How do you feel the first managers season has gone?
Personally I wasn’t an advocate of Silva coming in.
I’m not sure where his reputation as an excellent manager came from. He had a win percentage of 36.4% at Hull (which admittedly was a difficult job), but then an even worse record of 30.8% at Watford.
Given their group of players, that’s preposterous really, despite all the justifications bandied about as to why his reign tailed off.
Even the pre-season was a massive disappointment, losing 3-0 to Blackburn Rovers being the low point.
Despite that the team showed real promise at the start of the campaign. Yes, we were conceding but we also looked dangerous on the attack, now it’s like watching the England of old. We string some passes together but most of them are side to side and then we get picked off.
There are now eleven games remaining in this season, five of those against top six teams. If we don’t get a positive record from the other six games, then I’d count this as our worst post-Moyes season.
Do you think Silva needs more time to develop the large project at Goodison?
This is such a tough question. Where do you draw the line between the benefit of stability at the club, which we sorely need, and the negative of the club seemingly continuing its steady downward spiral?
I used to be extremely proud that in David Moyes we had the third longest reigning manager in the Premier League and it showed in the way our club climbed from relegation battles to getting into that fifth spot on a quasi-regular basis.
I think that despite where we finish this season he should be given at least the summer to get his brand of football embedded in the team.
Gylfi Sigurdsson’s impact has dwindled in recent weeks. What do you make of his contributions since Christmas?
Sigurdsson is being highlighted, just as Gomes was a few weeks ago.
Players have ups and downs, but because we’re losing so many games everyone is looking for a scapegoat.
Because Siggy is our most expensive player and our “creative spark” the blame is falling on him.
Nobody is playing particularly well in reality. Every game we can pick one or two players who have a good game but we are expecting Sigurdsson to work miracles.
Yes, he has fallen off the pace, but nobody in the team seems willing to take a risk to play a difficult ball that might get a player in or play a fast forward pass that might beat the defender.
Every game we play side to side until we get bored then we sling a cross in. If we had Duncan Ferguson still playing that might work, but we don’t have anyone of that stature so it doesn’t.
What would constitute a successful season now?
We need to win all our games outside of the top six teams, and maybe pinch a win off one or two of the top six.
That’s the only way fans can go into the summer period with a genuine sense of positivity, and the only real way Silva can convince the doubters that he has the answers to help repair the cracks in our club.
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Any other business?
Yes! I do not think all our set-piece frailties are due to the zonal marking system.
I think one of our biggest issues is the number of players we are putting in to defend corners. Firstly the box is that crowded that our players have no room to move to get a decent jump, so are regularly out-jumped by the incoming offense.
A 10-man defence of a set piece should be reserved for the dying embers of a hard fought 1-0 game, not every single set piece.
Stick two players into that space between the box and the halfway line and watch as teams send less players at us on set-pieces and we have the chance to counter-attack.
