Hey everyone, won’t you look at this shiny big balloon I just nearly passed out blowing up! Isn’t it lovely? Just watch it soar.
Everton are the pin, dear reader. And not just any pin, but a pin made of the sharpest material known on Earth filed to the tiniest of points and heated to 1000 degrees. And oh, does this pin love a balloon to jab.
One game. That’s all it took to ruin a huge swathe of Evertonians this season. One sunny 3pm Saturday kick off with new kits in the stand and dreams of stability interspersed with whimsical Goodison nostalgia, but along came the fucking pin. Suddenly three months of detachment and easy moods came to a POP and fume spewed once more from the habitually violent Volcano Everton. Even the calm and apathetic were buried in its unforgiving ash.
And that’s just how we roll. None of us get to gate-keep how to support Everton really as there’s a multitude of different people and different perspectives on how it is, and how it should be. I sometimes wonder how would we be if Everton ever achieved sustainable success? I do hope we’d still find a way to still do our civil war thing. And objectively it’s kinda healthy as it prevents us being in a weird fan base wide echo chamber as some others (you know who), and ensures a vibrant anarchistic democracy amongst Evertonians, a bulwark against any of us committing the cardinal sin of trying to speak on behalf of all Evertonians. We’re a non-homogenised bunch of weekend scarred stakeholders in the longest running Greek Tragedy since Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides drank wine and toasted how absurd this existence can be. They’d be season ticket holders at Everton if alive today.
The Brighton game didn’t start too badly, however a few tweaks from Brighton’s YTS lad on the bench and Everton’s dastardly tactic of lash the ball long to Harrison on the right was casually unpicked. From then on in we were just waiting for the usual painful moment to come. That it came after a controversial overturned penalty was a lovely reintroduction to weekend Evertoning. But let’s draw a line under that and look forward.
Onto Tottenham Hotspur then who started their season a little less disappointingly with an away draw at Leicester. Spurs have noticeable parallels with Everton, leaning towards romantic traditionalism and identity whilst often falling foul to the dark forces of tragedy which pervade them, as they do us. Values and integrity and staunch dedication to task mean shit really in this modern age of football where your ability to spend riches and circumnavigate token rules guarding/protecting competition are a much more accurate marker of success. This is a Thatcher of a league of a league we play in, one of vain self interest and fuck you to everyone else. Thrive or die. Tottenham are a touch ahead of Everton right now and recently transitioned a new stadium which did impact their spending and performance on the pitch but thanks to more stable ownership the threat of relegation, points deductions, four failed takeovers and indeed insolvency and death of their club itself didn’t really trouble them. Can’t shake the feeling they perhaps missed out on all the good stuff.
I’ve got a few good Spurs fans so – sadly – its another preview where I can’t bring myself to typecast them cruelly as fuck knows we need allies in this league that make us feel less alone. I don’t think we’re in a position to sneer at their paucity of trophies from where we sit. Being fucked repeatedly by Lady Luck brings a certain humility and ease about one’s nature over time, gone are any notions of entitlement and arrogance that can pervade opposition fans in interactions. You’re less eager to head pat, to sing shit songs, to hold your arms out wide and offer out a stranger 55 metres away behind lines of stewards, police and other fans despite you being a zitty noodle armed young male with questionable hygiene and a patchwork of a personality you’ve unconvincingly copy and pasted from shit films and other lads you’re dead scared of, you’re unlikely to obsess over the perceived “size” of your club on the internet and – in very general terms – much easier to have a pint with. I enjoy beers with Spurs fans, and long may that continue.
Their arl arse of a Manager is exactly the type of outback male you’ll find at the end of the bar that goes out of his way to ensure everyone knows he is less arsed than anyone else. About anything. Listen he just doesn’t care, mate. What a perma-stubbled tutting smorgasbord of forced antipodean scepticism. Calm the fuck down mate, why you so bothered? He’s got an aspirational resting BPM of 32 which is below an average coma because he just doesn’t fucking care, mate. He can’t wait to make a snide comment to anyone who gets even a little bit excited about something, like a viper sat there waiting to pounce on any misplaced enthusiasm or passion through judgemental fat fucking eyes. Which as it happens is my preferred company really, so I’m a huge fan of his indifference to British media trying to generate hysteria in interviews and press conferences. Get to fuck, ask him another question, he’s gonna patronisingly call you mate and laugh out the side of his mouth at you even though his eyes don’t move.
Your man Postegcolou is a manager of ideals and a well defined way of playing attacking football, which should be absolute catnip for Spurs fans. Problem is that in this aforementioned Thatcher of a league fan patience is at premium. As soon as two defeats in a row come your way, that media you’ve just been rolling your obese eyes at can’t wait to start agitating your job security so they can write all sorts of shit about you. You ok mate? Then next thing they got you snapping at them and them fuckers, well them fuckers with the print get to feed you to your own fans until a billionaire owner decides the noise is so loud that you’re fucking toast, mate. And then replaces you with a pragmatist, as that’s just how it works. Idealist manager is replaced by pragmatist manager who’s replaced by idealist manager and so the conveyor belt of manager styles oscillates – with each being the antidote to the other’s failure – until it spins, spins, spins all the way around the plug hole and sucks you down. Moyes to Martinez to Koeman to Silva to Allardyce to Ancelotti to Benitez to Lampard to Dyche. Idealists, pragmatists, in a neat repeating pattern. The football isn’t exciting enough we pay to be entertained, so hello idealist. We’re shipping too many goals and don’t have a backbone, so hello pragmatist. And thus in that repetition the deadly vortex of fucked modern zombie clubs ensues.
Taking a breath to stop here I’m not really sure what Spurs fans think of Ange Postecoglou but they’re sure as shit got someone who’ll prioritise grocks at the back and being a threat on set pieces coming after him.
Anyway, Spurs have a whole host of twats playing for them who can’t wait to score against Everton like Son, the phoney heart-with-your-hands-gesture when he scores fuck, Richarlison if he gets on the pitch, Dominic fucking Solanke – the murder Swayze in a NY alley rat-bastard – is a nap to score a debut brace, James Maddison the smug little Tory prefect, and that Romero the shithouse at the back. I’ve never seen an Everton out of the game by minute 35 more in my life than this fixture. Ash, just thick ash layered, everywhere, creating a time capsule for humans from the future find of us preserved in the terror we perished in, to create laborious documentaries about then sail cruise ships nearby offloading future humans to gawp at our hideous death poses, and be sucked into buying commemorative mementos produced by whoever is the industrial slave nation of the planet at that time.
On that optimistic note let’s talk about what Everton may bring to this game.
Dyche has galvanised the fans with news that he’s down to 14 fit senior players, Tarkowski now taking the knock and leaving a defence that’s less than secure. If there’s one thing Everton can’t afford it’s an injury crisis with the limited squad left from these years of strife. I’m guessing DCL will start up front again but anticipate changes behind him as overt pragmatism (!!!) of Dyche opted for his regular players from last season in their first fixture rather than new signings, which really irked some fans. Ndiaye and the Danish lad will feature at some point, unless Dyche really really wants to wind up the dars. That Tim lad looks very pleasant in the middle with Gueye as Splinter to his Donatello. You can guess the defence and keeper, why wait to boo subs when you can go from the first whistle?
So a one game crisis then with the backdrop of another “interesting” character trying to buy Everton. Wish Moshiri would just fuck off but sell to someone who will invoke feelings to capability and even optimism via their ownership. You could perhaps say nothing invokes anxiety than flirting with a Textor and finding out you’re their second choice.
Despite moments of frenzy above I’m pretty easy as there’s 37 to go and at some point I hope they’ll get some obstinate form going as last season, which is enough to get us into that shiny new stadium. Then we can talk rebirth.
Enjoy your weekend, or at least until that POP.