All week I have following the sporting headlines in the newspapers and have been surprised how few mentions there have been about Everton or the possibility the manager could lose his job. Not completely ignored , but not far off it.
I see that tonight the broadsheets are finally beginning to cover the story , and it will be a big story when/if he goes.
People talk about the club having gone backwards during his time, but strangely, even though results have been very poor, he has been successful in putting the nucleus of a very good squad together.
Robles, Lukaku, Lennon, Funes Mori, Cleverley, McCarthy, Besic , Deulofeu, Galloway have all been brought in by RM and although some have had a difficult time recently they are good players. Of course there are a couple of duds signed as well.
On top of this Barkley, Stones and Browning have oprogressed very well during his three years here and the academy seems to be flourishing more than it ever has.
These are not small accomplishments ,and he should get the credit deserved.
However, at the end of the day he is judged on one team alone and that is where he has fallen down.
RM seems to be an intelligent man. I am to this day surprised that having put together successfully certain aspects of the team that he has continually refused to address the Achilles heel that has been our defence and the goals conceded.
His failure could be boiled down to about five or six disastrous games where victories were thrown away. We could easily have a points total now closer to sixty than fifty without doing anything hugely different.
I wonder about his mentality, I wonder what his coaching staff were doing. I wonder if he listened to anybody at all.
I think the momentum has reached a level making it impossible for him to stay, and yet the margin between success and failure comes down to a few specific results.
Fifteen points more, two semifinals reached, I don't think there would be too many calls for his head.
