I'm back!
Just to say whilst I back our owners statement over this mornings news, I don't believe Everton did anything wrong. You saw something you wanted and you went after it. Seems we won the battle then...but you may end up winning the war. I so wanted Silva to knuckle down once you appointed BFS but our statement this morning says that he did the exact opposite and effectively owned tools. He may well end up at yours in the summer, or before. But you should let those words ring in your ears because its likely he will do the same further down the line.
He carries no favour with any of us anymore. Not because he wanted to join you - I understood that to a point. Bigger club, more money etc etc. But his attitude since has burnt any bridge left to him.
You may well get your other wish too now I suspect as the fans will want Z-Cars gone too.
The bullish amongst you will no doubt crow about this mornings news, thats to be expected from football fans. The rest of you should be wary about Silva IMO.
Good luck for the rest of the season and see you all for a fiery game at the end of February!
Thanks for coming back mate, it took a big man to do that and very magnanimous in your words.
I suspect all 3 lost the battle to be frank. Everton, Watford and Silva have all lost in this. Watford are probably down 15 million quid, in trouble with relegation and will struggle to attract the calibre of manager they could in November when they were 8th. We are lumbered with Allardyce, and Silva's reputation has taken a massive hit.
It's easy to blame the Watford owners. I think both boards will have learnt a lot from the process and made mistakes. I think Moshiri will have learnt you can't just bully people and attempts to do so will often entrench opponents. He also has to accept, his reputation and ego is not enough to wow counterparts. As yet he has yet to create anything to write home about at Everton and until then if he approaches clubs, mid season for their managers it will likely lead to a hardening of resolve.
For your board I think they may come to accept that keeping a manager who doesn't want to be at a club rarely works well. They also have to commit to managers more, get them on longer deals etc and begin to show commitment. You see to locate fantastic managers on each occasion, but currently it only takes one poor appointment to get relegated so you are putting pressure on yourselves.
I worry about Silva as I would with any manager. He's a man in a hurry, but it feels a nice fit currently. In all honesty it will be nice to be in a position where a manager has outperformed targets to be in a position to be taken off us, with a handy pay out rather than continually having to fork out for managers and conduct obtuse and disorganised searches for a manager. I also think within the footballing world, we are seen to be a bit more loyal to managers (albeit not since Moshiri came) and he would have to go some to get a better job than Everton (not because we are great, but because he will have a fair bit of mending of his reputation).
In a strange way, ourselves and Watford are in the same sort of category, which I would argue we are towards the top of while you guys are more in the middle, but with legitimate ambitions to get to the top of as well. The next jump he makes will likely be a qualitative jump and I am not sure people will be cuing up for him unless he really turns his next club around?
It will be difficult to judge him. He obviously has to look at his own conduct, but also Watford's players seem to throw managers under the bus once they know they are leaving. I've seen it with Mazzarri and QSF who both did a really good job up until about March. I remember warning you of this, as a similar slump in November would be very dangerous. I judge him up until we made an approach, and view him on what I saw with my own eyes, which was Watford were a terrific team and dominated at Goodison for an hour, and probable the chaos of the Gomes injury prevented you picking up a win.
If he came, I sense he'd stay 18 months and would be off, but I also think he'd leave us in better shape than he inherited us. Had he have left at the opportune moment with you guys you'd have said the same.
