The official Everton FC Supporters thread

[Bingo]

everton flying again at the end of the season ( in the premiership anyway ). thats 4 goals in our last 3 league games. 1st time we've done that since 1964 apparently. what a steal jelavic is proving to be. another shrewd signing from moyes. if only we could start the season the way we finish.

Read that this the 1st time a team has scored 4 goals 3 games in a row in Prem league.Jelavic is fastest player to score 10 goals for Everton in a 100 years.Most natural finisher we have had since Tony Cottee.

See we are being linked with Clint Dempsey.Him and Jelavic would make a great partnership. Sign up Pienar and either Landon Donovan or Hoillett from Blackburn and we would have some team for next year.

You's are starting to sound like us neighbours across the park 

[johnneycool]

But is Pienaar not just back on loan?

Yes, but probably with the option to buy as he wasn't a success with spurs. Don't think Everton would have the money to buy him back unless they sold someone else like Fellaini.

[SHEEDY]

a hard fought point tonight at the brittannia. played well enough to deserve all 3 but a draw keeps our good league form going. with liverpool losing again it keeps us ahead of them with 2 games left.
gibson was missing tonight with an injury hopefully not to serious.

[Orangemac]

a hard fought point tonight at the brittannia. played well enough to deserve all 3 but a draw keeps our good league form going. with liverpool losing again it keeps us ahead of them with 2 games left.
gibson was missing tonight with an injury hopefully not to serious.

4 points from 2 games will leave us above Liverpool for the 1st time in 7 years which would be some acheivement by Moyes considering the amount of money Liverpool have spent.

[EC Unique]

Well done everton. Best team in Liverpool.

[SHEEDY]

brilliant win and performance today.  pienaar again pulling the strings and another goal from jelavic. hopefully moyes can get a few quid in the summer. resigning pienaar has to be priority. 7th place and top team on merseyside is good way to end the season.

[GalwayBayBoy]

Congratulation to Everton on collecting their trophy as top league side on Merseyside today. Mind you they did still manage to lose to Liverpool three times during the season.

[Mr. Nakata]

Amazing day today. Drama at it's best. Well done Everton on a decent season post january. First 5 months we were shite....But I think the Galway koppite has a point. We were robbed at Goodison by a shocking performance by referee Martin Atkinson. Then we gifted the dirties 3 points by putting out a b team at anfield. Finally we bottled it at wembly. I was there and can still scarcely believe what I witnessed. As much as I've enjoyed Pienaar totally transforming our performances and Jelavic banging in over a dozen goals, something doesn't sit right with me. Moyes' record speaks for itself, but he needs to realise that we're better than liverpool....roll on the gaa......

[From the Bunker]

Have great admiration for Everton and how much they over achieve. This statement is nearly a contradiction as they as a club of such history and stature should be finishing in the 7th and higher. But the ways of modern football sees them in the continual cage of being outside the money clubs. Moyles produces miracles after miracles each year. Like their wealthier neighbours, they need a new stadium.

[johnneycool]

Have great admiration for Everton and how much they over achieve. This statement is nearly a contradiction as they as a club of such history and stature should be finishing in the 7th and higher. But the ways of modern football sees them in the continual cage of being outside the money clubs. Moyles produces miracles after miracles each year. Like their wealthier neighbours, they need a new stadium.

You'd wonder why it wouldn't make sense to have a shared stadium like the San Siro in Milan, both clubs would benefit immeasurably from it.

As for not having money, when you see how Blackburn have went under the stewardship of Venkeys, then sometimes its better the devil you know. Kenright doesn't have the money to scratch himself in premiership terms but he's got the clubs best interests at heart and maybe the best man for a few more years as I can see the big money from Sky beginning to dry up.

[deiseach]

You'd wonder why it wouldn't make sense to have a shared stadium like the San Siro in Milan, both clubs would benefit immeasurably from it.

I've been arguing that for years and get utterly slaughtered every time. It's gas how each set of fans is so eager to jettison the history that comes with Anfield and Goodison Park in the interests of making more money yet also want to spend tens (hundreds?) of millions extra on building and maintaining a separate stadium so that they can maintain the purity of the Volk.

[Bingo]

You'd wonder why it wouldn't make sense to have a shared stadium like the San Siro in Milan, both clubs would benefit immeasurably from it.

I've been arguing that for years and get utterly slaughtered every time. It's gas how each set of fans is so eager to jettison the history that comes with Anfield and Goodison Park in the interests of making more money yet also want to spend tens (hundreds?) of millions extra on building and maintaining a separate stadium so that they can maintain the purity of the Volk.

I think alot of it largely boils down to the fact that Everton have absolutely nothing to bring to the table in terms of finance or long term funding to it. Any grounds they have looked at is largely partnerships and handouts. I read recently they don't even have money to build a new club shop at Goodison. Capacity requirements is also a problem.

It annoys me that Groundshare only ever gets mentioned for Liverpool/Everton. Never any other clubs. Also is it not the case that it has proven to be problematic in other countries and that in Italy in particular clubs are trying to get away for the groundshares?

I should also have added, I don't think Liverpool have the funds to build a new one themselves, as the maths just doesn't add up. It is realistically going cost 400m or whatever for 20,000 new seats plus their isn't any value in Anfield in terms of resale nor do they have the corporate market or pricing freedom that other clubs would have.

[Evil Genius]

You'd wonder why it wouldn't make sense to have a shared stadium like the San Siro in Milan, both clubs would benefit immeasurably from it.

I've been arguing that for years and get utterly slaughtered every time. It's gas how each set of fans is so eager to jettison the history that comes with Anfield and Goodison Park in the interests of making more money yet also want to spend tens (hundreds?) of millions extra on building and maintaining a separate stadium so that they can maintain the purity of the Volk.

Whenever people talk about shared stadia etc, they usually point to Italy as an example.

Yet this misses the point, since the thing about italian club stadia is not that they are shared, but that they are (almost) invariably municipally owned. And if a city has two senior clubs, the local Council won't want to build separate stadia, but will instead force them to share. In fact, they sometimes have to share it with an Athletics track, too eg Roma and Lazio in the Stadio Olympico.

Of course, the fact that Italian clubs didn't have to shell out for an expensive stadium and upkeep etc gave them a (short-term) financial advantage over eg their English rivals in past times. But as fans have demanded better/safer facilities and the Marketing guys have learned how to make money from corporate sources (Boxes, catering, hospitality, conferences etc), English clubs have invested billions upgrading or replacing their stadia, whilst (cash-strapped) Italian Councils have failed to invest similarly for Serie A clubs.

In fact, I think I'm right in saying that the only new football-only Serie A stadium built in the last quarter century has been that of Juventus and even then, with a capacity of "just" 41k and a construction cost of "only" €120m, it doesn't sound that special for one of the giants of the world game - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juventus_Stadium.

Meanwhile, their neighbours and former co-tenants Torino are stuck in the (municipal) Stadio Olympico - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadio_Olimpico_di_Torino - which their fans hate.  And prior to these developments, both clubs shared the (municipal) Stadio delle Alpi, which I can tell you from personal experience, was pretty dreadful, hence both teams' desperation to get out of it:
"The poor visibility led to extraordinarily low attendances. For example, in the Coppa Italia home match against Sampdoria in the 2001–02 season, only 237 spectators showed up"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadio_delle_Alpi

In fact, had it not been for the Italian Government pumping cash into new stadia for the 1990 World Cup (and 2006 Winter Olympics), then Italian football stadia would be far behind those of their rivals in England, Spain, Germany etc.

And in any case, if the worst comes to the worst and a club gets into serious financial difficulty, it is much more likely to be rescued by a new investor if it already owns it own stadium outright, than if it rents and/or shares a stadium - see Rangers, for example.

[Evil Genius]

It annoys me that Groundshare only ever gets mentioned for Liverpool/Everton. Never any other clubs. Also is it not the case that it has proven to be problematic in other countries and that in Italy in particular clubs are trying to get away for the groundshares?

You're quite right about Italy, Bingo (see my previous post)

I should also have added, I don't think Liverpool have the funds to build a new one themselves, as the maths just doesn't add up. It is realistically going cost 400m or whatever for 20,000 new seats plus their isn't any value in Anfield in terms of resale nor do they have the corporate market or pricing freedom that other clubs would have.

And you're correct about the (financially unjustifiable) cost of enlarging Anfield, too.

But Liverpool are between a rock and a hard place, since building a new Stadium elsewhere could cost anything up to £500m, which is a huge amount to gamble on a club which is going nowhere on the pitch at the moment.

As for sharing with Everton, even if each club had, say, £200m (and EFC certainly don't), no owner of either club is going to accept being the minor partner i.e. less than 50% ownership, since the other club could use their majority to drive through changes (rent, renovation, facilities) which suit only it.

And 50:50 ownership would be potentially even worse, since neither club would be in a position to make changes  for its own advantage.

Remember, wealthy investors invariably insist on control over their investment, and a ground-share inevitably dilutes or compromises that. Which is why eg the first thing Spurs did when they decided to replace WHL was to de-list their shares from the Stock Exchange i.e. owner Joe Lewis (or his new investors?) are not prepared to be beholden even to minority shareholders, in the way eg Abramovic is to the Chelsea Pitch Owners.

[Orangemac]

As if rumours around Fellaini and Baines leaving aren't bad enough

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/david-moyes-is-spurs-choice-to-replace-881940

Twitter suggesting compensation being discussed with Everton. If true Moyes gave us 10 great years compared to the shambles we were under Walter Smith. Would like to see Martinez given a chance, he is used to working with a small budget whcih would be the case at Everton.