I have said before on here in another thread and in my opinion it is still a truth....Martinez had a wake up call at a precise moment in his Everton career. That moment was the 6-2 defeat by Chelsea. We had scored twice against arguably the best team in the league..good 'football' goals as well, but we had shipped six goals at home. Everton up to that moment had been an attractive team to watch, and had been largely successful results wise. From that moment Martinez realised that we weren't Wigan, and that an entirely gung ho attitude would eventually lead to disaster. We started concentrating on 'defending' ...so nuch so that for a while the team seemed to be getting mixed messages in training, and this led to confusion on the field of play, which led to players holding on to the ball for long periods ...simply because they were afraid to lose possession. You've got to take chances in football, even if youre the best, but we were not prepared to take chances, we needed to 'make sure' about everything, and thus we became very easy to play against. I think Martinez realised this, and he has taken steps to overcome the problem. As the season goes on we will be more confident and consequently more successful. The catalyst may be a new signing in this window, it may even be Cleverley, or even Barkley if his potential is suddenly realised(encouraging signs against Watford, in patches). The complainers will always complain...its their right and there are probably deep sociological reasons why some people are never ever happy, all the anger in their life being directed at the easy targets of Martinez, Kenwright, Kone(!), refereees, etc. but I think top eight is a certainty for us and because the competition is the toughest for years just below the top three in the league, we could finish anywhere between 4th and 8th. This requires Arsenal, Chelsea ,one of the Manc clubs to have a poor season, but one of them is due a poor season. Won't be surprised to see another score draw in our next fixture, either !
