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Is This the Worst Period in Our History

Raino85 said:
A large percentage (anyone under the age of 40) of the crowd that go to the game will not of experienced a single one of league or cup wins.

The last 5 years has been a slog, our record at home has been woeful since Silva
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I get that but it's more the idea that the new ground will be any different. The sad thing is I doubt anyone within the club right now is doing anything to make sure the stadium move does result in a more successful period for us. The new owners, whoever they are, have got one hell of a job.
 
dannyboy said:
I think the "I can't stand Goodison" posts on Twitter just show a huge naivety. People see the ground as being synonymous with failure but while we've been there we've won 8 league titles, 5 FA Cups and the Cup Winners Cup. It's all seen top flight football nearly every year since its inception.

It would be a brave betting man that says we'll see anywhere near that amount of success if we stay about BMD for 100 years.
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I dunno, Danny. I saw the mid 80s team and even I think Goodison was built on an Indian burial ground - or at least the blue gravel that Kenwright trucked in came from the tomb of an ancient civilization.

At this point, I associate it with managed decline, deliberate underinvestment, "good times", the threat of no longer getting a safety certificate, and an old boys club.

Most of all, you can smell Kenwright coming out of the walls, pillars, and foundations of the place.

PURGE!
 
Interesting to read opinions of older blues who have seen the good and the bad.

I was a bit too young to remember the FA Cup in 95, so I’ve never seen us win anything. There’s been a few flashes of success being within reach, but ultimately we’ve always fallen short or fizzled out.

It’s the worst period for me because I’ve never felt less engaged or in love with Everton. I still watch every game, but I don’t get excited about it anymore. Hopefully new ownership and the new stadium freshen things up, but I get the feeling that modern football has killed off a lot of the magic. We’ll probably never reach the heights we once did, ditto for all but a handful of clubs.
 
maccavennie said:
Everything about this current crapness points to it being the biggest crap of them all. It's not just about the football on the pitch, it's PSR, FFP, VAR, points deductions......I could go on about why it's so bad.

We love Everton out of habit, not for any other reason. The football is disgusting, the majority of them are overpaid tossers who are managed by an even worse overpaid gobshite with an ego the size of Everest.

I'm 46, so I've seen the decline from 88-94 then 97 up to when Moyes came in and put a bit of fire back in the Everton belly. But this run, since Martinez got canned, has just been utterly depressing and this season in particular is just that one step closer to wishing Everton never existed.
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I agree with all of that mate. Hopefully with the new stadium and new owners better times are around the corner for us.
 

It’s certainly the most boring and by far the least entertaining. A lot of it is on football in general tbf because even if Everton get good then what? They’re still not winning anything.

Football is pointless.
 
Drico said:
I dunno, Danny. I saw the mid 80s team and even I think Goodison was built on an Indian burial ground - or at least the blue gravel that Kenwright trucked in came from the tomb of an ancient civilization.

At this point, I associate it with managed decline, deliberate underinvestment, "good times", the threat of no longer getting a safety certificate, and an old boys club.

Most of all, you can smell Kenwright coming out of the walls, pillars, and foundations of the place.

PURGE!
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The threat of "failing the safety certificate" only demonstrates the paucity and naivety of that argument..... by the fact that it is essentially built on a lie. An argument that is possibly far less credible than someone saying that our current perilous state is entirely due to BMD's fiscal madness, which may point to an entirely "cursed" site, having been built on a Dock named after a prominent Slave owner..... an equally nonsensical assertion, but at least built on both historical and financial facts.

Far from the "Indian Burial Ground" analogy, you could argue that Goodison Park has been our Talisman for over 130 yrs, illustrated by the fact that it is the stadium that has comfortably witnessed more top flight games than any other in the country. (Second only to Celtic Park in the world). Its reputation now only desecrated by the incompetence, lies and managed decline of the last regime, who allowed the once finest football stadium in the country, to fall so far behind ..... Therefore, its name should never be sullied by that association. Goodison Park was built by the club's founding fathers and subsequent boards who shared a vision. Giants of football and ambitious stadium innovation such as Will Cuff and Archibald Leitch. It's not Goodison's fault that the Charlatans of most of the past 30yrs failed to continue and respect that tradition. Let's hope that Moshiri did!
 
Like most things, I think the question of whether this is worse that the 90s depends on your age. I’m 42 and my first proper season following them was Wimbledon, the second was the FA Cup. There were times during that period that I was optimistic, like when Smith came and brought in Matterazzi and Dacourt.

Since then, we’ve had periods of supporting a normal football team - late Moyes/ early Martinez - when you enjoyed watching them and felt that we could ‘kick on’. Qualifying for Europe have the illusion that we were back among the big boys.

Now feels different. It’s hard to say whether it’s just because I’m older and so have left time left to be optimistic about or if it’s, as other posters have said, football isn’t fun anymore.
 
Tom Hughes said:
The threat of "failing the safety certificate" only demonstrates the paucity and naivety of that argument..... by the fact that it is essentially built on a lie. An argument that is possibly far less credible than someone saying that our current perilous state is entirely due to BMD's fiscal madness, which may point to an entirely "cursed" site, having been built on a Dock named after a prominent Slave owner..... an equally nonsensical assertion, but at least built on both historical and financial facts.

Far from the "Indian Burial Ground" analogy, you could argue that Goodison Park has been our Talisman for over 130 yrs, illustrated by the fact that it is the stadium that has comfortably witnessed more top flight games than any other in the country. (Second only to Celtic Park in the world). Its reputation now only desecrated by the incompetence, lies and managed decline of the last regime, who allowed the once finest football stadium in the country, to fall so far behind ..... Therefore, its name should never be sullied by that association. Goodison Park was built by the club's founding fathers and subsequent boards who shared a vision. Giants of football and ambitious stadium innovation such as Will Cuff and Archibald Leitch. It's not Goodison's fault that the Charlatans of most of the past 30yrs failed to continue and respect that tradition. Let's hope that Moshiri did!
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I wasn't making that argument. I was referring to Kenwright's mendacity and outright charlatanism. The safety certificate lie was, arguably, the lowest point of his nefarious reign. Well, until headlock-gate, anyway,

I love Goodison. But it smells of failure now after a glorious history up to that cursed man's ascension to the board. Anybody under 40 will have seen nothing of that stadium's greatness. My idea of Everton - as a 52-year-old - is very different to a younger person's - and that's through no fault of theirs. We could see what was possible. They were simply fed excuses, lies, and "good times."

Obviously, I'm allowing recency bias to cloud my memory. But, more than that, I see the new stadium as the chance for the club to rise like a phoenix. There has to be a complete reset, and the thinking of the last 35 years has to be flushed into the Mersey.
 

Many years before I was born, but I'd assume the 50s were worse given we spent a few years in the 2nd division.

That being said, this is at least on par with the 90s - but even in that period we had the Royle 18 months or so in the middle of it where we won a trophy and finished top 6.

In the last decade we have been basically on the decline slowly but surely the entire time, to the point that for the last 3 years we've had a team playing the worst football in the division and playing footsy with relegation. It's grim. I get practically no enjoyment from Everton currently and I haven't for a good while. Yes, I can be objective about the reasons why but that changes very little about how I feel.

I've got two lads, 13 and 16, and I feel sorry for both of them. They're growing up as blues in one of the worst periods we've ever had.

Ok, there's light possibly at the end of the tunnel, but no fanbase has suffered like ours in the top division. I often think that it might have been better if we'd gone down and come back up, mentally that might have been like ripping the plaster off, but no blue could ever *want* that to happen, so instead we suffer.
 
toffeeblue9 said:
Many years before I was born, but I'd assume the 50s were worse given we spent a few years in the 2nd division.

That being said, this is at least on par with the 90s - but even in that period we had the Royle 18 months or so in the middle of it where we won a trophy and finished top 6.

In the last decade we have been basically on the decline slowly but surely the entire time, to the point that for the last 3 years we've had a team playing the worst football in the division and playing footsy with relegation. It's grim. I get practically no enjoyment from Everton currently and I haven't for a good while. Yes, I can be objective about the reasons why but that changes very little about how I feel.

I've got two lads, 13 and 16, and I feel sorry for both of them. They're growing up as blues in one of the worst periods we've ever had.

Ok, there's light possibly at the end of the tunnel, but no fanbase has suffered like ours in the top division. I often think that it might have been better if we'd gone down and come back up, mentally that might have been like ripping the plaster off, but no blue could ever *want* that to happen, so instead we suffer.
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They have.
Leeds,Sunderland and them Geordies have suffered mate.
We're just infuriating.
 
chrismpw said:
Bad periods have happened in the past, certainly. This one compares, no doubt about it. But what makes the present worse, is that in the past a few good signings and a decent coach could see you have a good season, maybe win something.

Today, theres none if that hope - good signings are only affordable by those teams Sky have made big. I doubt we will ever see a non-sky team win a major trophy in our lifetimes - Leicester was a fluke - either that or a script by Sky to help their marketing department avoid the accusations of stagnation / stratification.
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Moyes did it with West Ham. Took them from relegation certs to 3 seasons in Europe, a semi final and then trophy. Emery has done wonders at Villa in a short time.

Competing at the top is harder than ever but you can be a good top half team and get in Europe quickly if you do things right.
 

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