It has been a chastening start to the season for Everton, with four Premier League defeats on the spin and an early Carabao Cup exit quickly souring the mood at Goodison Park.
There were boos for manager Sean Dyche’s decision to substitute striker Beto for defender Ashley Young during Tuesday’s game against Southampton, a tie eventually surrendered on penalties, while his side has also been unusually leaky and squandered leads.
It has prompted fears Everton are gearing up for a fourth successive relegation battle. But with 34 games to play, there is still plenty of time to turn things around.
The Athletic takes a look at what is going wrong for Everton and how it can be fixed.
Dyche brings his slow starts to Everton
This has been Everton’s worst start to a Premier League season and their record so far makes for sorry reading.
They are one of only two teams — promoted Southampton being the other — yet to pick up a point and have conceded a league-high 13 times in their opening four games. Their misery has been compounded by the manner of the defeats.
Everton were soundly beaten by Brighton & Hove Albion and Tottenham, but squandered two-goal leads in their against Bournemouth and Aston Villa, becoming just the second team in Premier League history to do so in back-to-back games. They are exhibiting a fragility, both defensively and mentally, rarely associated with Dyche’s teams.
As the below graphic shows, Dyche has made a habit of starting slowly, particularly in August where his 12 per cent win ratio is the second-worst of any manager to have taken charge of 10 games or more.
Does his gruelling, running-heavy pre-season take its toll on his players? Is the fact tactical instruction is only introduced later into summer leaving them playing catch-up compared to their rivals? And does his reluctance to trust some new signings early on mean Everton tend to peak later in a campaign?
Whatever the reality, he has not yet found a way to put it right.
The obvious caveat here is that most of his record stems from his near decade-long tenure at Burnley, where he was often competing at the bottom of the division. And while historically Everton have tended to start stronger, Dyche’s predecessor Frank Lampard also encountered problems at the beginning of 2022-23.
That start under Lampard was in part undermined by Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s injury problems and a lack of striking options. With Neal Maupay and other additions coming through the door later in the window, Lampard was forced to experiment with Anthony Gordon and Demarai Gray as somewhat ill-fitting false nines.
Few lessons can be learned from going much further back. The comparatively steady starts under David Moyes (between 2002-03 and 2012-13) came at a time of relative stability for the club on and off the pitch.
That is not the case now, with Dyche and director of football Kevin Thelwell working in particularly challenging conditions.
It often feels as though Dyche delivers the same season on a loop: a poor start, followed by resurgence before Christmas, a drop-off as the festive period takes its toll and then enough wins at the end to survive.
He and Everton will hope the same happens again.
Certainly, there is more cause for optimism when looking at the fixture list, with Opta judging them to have the easiest opening 10 games of any in the league.
Given they have already had three of their more challenging fixtures so far, against Brighton and away trips to Tottenham and Villa, the next six games on paper offer a better chance of picking up points.
Struggle in those matches, though, and they may really be in trouble heading into a tough December.
Absences hitting hard
Asked by The Athletic after Tuesday’s cup defeat to explain the poor start, Dyche pinpointed injuries as one key factor.
Tuesday was the most extreme example of the season by far, but the Everton manager had just 12 senior outfield players at his disposal due to injuries and sickness.
There was always a fear that Everton would be undercooked heading into the new campaign. The Athletic detailed over the summer how 13 players, including key figures such as Jordan Pickford, James Tarkowski and Idrissa Gueye, had missed parts of pre-season, many through injury.
They have continued to resemble the walking wounded during the opening month.
Defensive stalwart Tarkowski, yet to miss a league game since joining in the summer of 2022, has been playing through injury while captain Seamus Coleman has also been in and out of the team. Other absences have been keenly felt, too.
Tarkowski has been playing through injury (David Rogers/Getty Images)
Defensive concerns
Ask anyone at Everton who has been the biggest single loss this season, though, and the answer would be Jarrad Branthwaite.
The defender was voted Players’ Player of the Season last time around but is yet to feature after undergoing surgery on a long-standing groin problem over the summer. Dyche admitted last week that the defender had taken longer than anticipated to recover after experiencing a number of “hiccups”.
In his absence, Michael Keane has been preferred to new signing Jake O’Brien in central defence. Keane, a long-time Dyche favourite from their time together at Burnley, was praised by coaching staff for his work in pre-season and again by Dyche after Tuesday’s defeat by Southampton.
The evidence suggests, though, that his partnership with Tarkowski is largely incompatible and too leaky. The pair are in the same mould; slower across the ground and more comfortable defending their box, even if Everton have also recently shown vulnerability there too. Neither possesses Branthwaite’s ability to track runners and cover vast spaces.
Everton have felt Branthwaite’s absence keenly (Naomi Baker/Getty Images)
Keane and Tarkowski’s flaws seem to be exacerbated when they are in the same back line. They have started together seven times since the start of last season, a relatively small sample size, but Everton have won just once and conceded 2.6 goals on average per game. They look most susceptible to movement and pace.
Branthwaite and Tarkowski, meanwhile, have won 12 of their 35 games together at a win rate of 34 per cent and conceded just 1.3 goals on average.
To the surprise of many, Everton have gone from the fourth-best defensive record in the league last season to the worst four games into this one. Staggeringly, they have already conceded over a quarter of last season’s total at this early juncture.
It would be reductive in the extreme to put these numbers merely down to Branthwaite’s absence, even if it is one important factor.
Tarkowski, battling a niggling glute injury, has struggled at times. Goalkeeper Pickford has also endured a difficult start by his high standards, seeing a notable drop off in his shot-stopping prowess.
One of the best in the league last year by this metric, the England No 1 has conceded three more goals than expected this season based on the quality of chances (xGOT) he has faced.
He has also struggled under the high ball, stopping only one of 57 crosses that have come into his box this season. His 1.8 per cent rate of stopping crosses is the lowest in the league and comfortably below last season’s total of 5.3 per cent.
Perhaps this is a hangover from the Euros and the fact he only returned towards the end of pre-season. Or maybe it is just an inevitable trough for an otherwise reliable goalkeeper. It would be a surprise, based on past performance, if this dip persisted too much longer.
Pickford has endured a difficult start (Marc Atkins/Getty Images)
Everton have had issues elsewhere, including at full-back and in midfield. Injuries to Coleman, Vitalii Mykolenko and Young’s suspension for a red card against Brighton have left them chopping and changing too often in a key area.
Further forward, they have lacked an adequate screen to protect their vulnerable defence. Aston Villa midfielder Youri Tielemans’ 34 passes into the final third against Everton last Saturday was comfortably the highest in a Premier League game so far this season and equalled the record from the last campaign.
Their xG per shot conceded is also the highest in the league. Dyche admitted after Saturday’s defeat at Villa Park that he may be asking too much of youngster Tim Iroegbunam, a summer signing, at this stage in his development.
Dyche has not yet found a way to shore Everton up this season. He rarely has a Plan B and normally relies on repetition and hard work to fix existing issues. If anything, his style may have exacerbated some of the problems so far.
A threadbare squad, hit by injuries and knocks, has had the lowest possession share in the league. The lack of ball retention, a key feature in Dyche sides, has left some in the setup wondering if they need to find ways of managing games and better alleviating opposition pressure. Everton are also the second oldest, ahead of only West Ham.
Dyche has made just 14 subs, the second-fewest, although finds himself sandwiched between Manchester City’s Pep Guardiola and Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta in that category.
A club in continued flux now feeling the strain on the pitch
There was always a sense at Goodison that Everton’s lack of investment would eventually come home to roost.
With their ownership situation unresolved and the club in a holding pattern for the best part of two years, the goal has merely been to keep heads above water. Key sales have been made in an attempt to achieve PSR compliance and meet the club’s running costs.
The pattern continued over summer with the £50million ($66.3m) departure of midfielder Amadou Onana to Aston Villa. With funds tight, he was replaced by Iroegbunam, for £9m, and Orel Mangala on loan.
The Belgian was highly rated at Everton, but his sale helped balance the books. Without him, they look weaker and less physically dominant in a crucial part of the pitch.
Onana playing for Villa against his former club (Marc Atkins/Getty Images)
Everton are the only Premier League side to have a positive transfer balance over the last five years. Just Ipswich Town, who have risen from League One to the top flight in just two seasons, have spent less in transfer fees on their squad. There is a feeling that things will only shift decisively on the pitch when the ownership situation is resolved and the funds are in place to compete in the market again.
Dyche and others at the club have spoken — both in public and private — about the impact of the ownership stasis and regular churn of bad news stories on morale. A sense of collective fatigue has set in.
Fans, too, have become tired of seeing their club being the whipping boys and voiced their displeasure with results and Dyche’s subs at times this season. Without results, his style of football offers them few crumbs of comfort.
The product of it all can be seen on the pitch, with a threadbare, underfunded group so far yet to be competitive this season.
So what are the solutions, and is Dyche at risk?
Let’s start with that second bit, as it is important.
As it stands, Dyche retains the support of key figures at Everton. The noises during the international break were that he would be given more time, and that message was reiterated after recent defeats.
Nobody at Goodison wants the cycle of managerial churn to continue if it can be helped, while the cost of a further change would also see their PSR position worsen.
Dyche is credited for saving Everton from relegation twice and the belief is that he was not given enough credit externally for the job he did last season. There is an understanding he has been made to work in challenging conditions and, having got them out of tougher predicaments before, can do so again this time around.
But results need to improve heading into what looks to be a more favourable run.
Dyche watches his team lose late to Bournemouth (Robbie Jay Barratt – AMA/Getty Images)
The main focus internally will be on getting key players back fit, integrated quickly and returning to the defensive solidity of last season.
Branthwaite, seen as the single biggest difference-maker in the squad, may not be able to fix everything by himself, but his return would be a significant boost. He and right-back Nathan Patterson are back in training and expected to feature for the club’s under-21 side this weekend as they step up their respective programmes. Together, they should bolster a creaking defence.
Unusually, there has been more positivity about Everton’s attack in recent weeks. Dwight McNeil leads the league for expected assists at this early juncture after being moved inside to the No 10 role, while Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Iliman Ndiaye have both impressed. It is hoped loan signing Jesper Lindstrom can add further dynamism to the forward line once he is fully up to speed.
But Dyche has not yet found the right balance or personnel to solve Everton’s issues. Usually, his sides are strong defensively but heavily reliant on set pieces in attack. For once, he now has a different problem to solve.
He should take a holistic view when it comes to solutions. Continuity in defence and more experience in midfield would be helpful.
Using his bench could help freshen things up when the side is looking fatigued. More ball possession and more control might allow them to take the sting out of games better and avoid damaging capitulations like the one against Bournemouth.
Dyche has unshakeable faith in his principles and believes his methods can eventually yield results. But Everton urgently need to break the bad news cycle and get some points on the board to stop the negativity from snowballing.
The next block of games feels pivotal. It will be on Dyche to find a way through.
(Top photo: Bradley Collyer/PA Images via Getty Images)
