Tottenham 4 Everton 0

Everton’s dire form continues unabated, with a 4-0 mauling away at Tottenham Hotspur extending the current winless run to six games in all competitions.

Of all the inexplicable decisions that have been made at various points this season, one of the more perplexing has been Sam Allardyce responding to a marked improvement in defensive solidity by breaking up the centre-back pairing of Ashley Williams and Mason Holgate; as while it’s fair to say that the Wales international has been less than popular during his 18-month spell at Goodison, he had finally started to show his worth in guiding the youngster through some of the best performances of his fledgling career. No one really expected much from le Grand Samuel and his gang of merry hucksters in terms of entertainment or even basic ball retention, but I don’t think any of us believed that he would ever in a million years take to arsing around with a defence that had finally looked halfway serviceable after months of shipping goals in twos, threes and fours.

The Blues actually started the game quite well, mostly due to the good work of big-money debutant Cenk Tosun, whose physicality and movement up top seemed to be giving Davinson Sanchez and Jan Vertonghen plenty to think about at the heart of the Spurs defence. With James McCarthy and Idrissa Gana Gueye sitting deep in front of the back four, Wayne Rooney, Gylfi Sigurdsson and Yannick Bolasie were able to get close to the Turkey international and look for opportunities to take advantage of his impressive holdup play; so much so that it wouldn’t have been completely undeserved if the linesman had failed to spot Rooney creeping just offside before heading past Hugo Lloris from close range. Unfortunately, though, the positive beginning proved to be less a statement of intent than a false dawn, as Son Heung-Min’s 26^th minute opener sent the travelling Ton retreating into their shells – like Ninja Turtles, except massive cowards.

If the lesson from getting good and walloped by Manchester United was that Rooney can’t play centre midfield against strong opposition, this chastening defeat was all about the false economy that is bringing in jarg utility journeymen to perform at a level that any academy kid could easily match or exceed. Cuco Martina has, bizarrely enough, in some ways looked better at left-back than he did in his natural position, but as time wears on and more outsiders become aware what is a desperate situation, the chances of him being identified as a weak link increase accordingly. This was never more evident than in the case of the first goal, where Mauricio Pochettino’s decision to push his right-back Serge Aurier as far up the pitch as possible resulted in him picking up possession in the Everton box, and firing a shot-cum-cross which an unmarked Son steered effortlessly into an empty net.

After making it to the break with only a one-goal deficit to overturn, the situation didn’t seem as bad as it could have been, all things considered. However, eye in the sky Craig Shakespeare is paid very handsomely to see things we’ll never see, and so there were no questions asked when he gave the half-time recommendation to activate Europa League mode. The players duly obliged, and within two minutes of the restart Harry Kane was wheeling away in celebration of a goal that took his personal league tally to within six of Everton’s total for the season. It came when Son made a mug of Jonjoe Kenny with a lovely turn which set him running off unopposed towards goal, before centring for Kane to stroke the ball beyond a helpless Jordan Pickford. There was more than a hint of offside, but that of course didn’t bother the England striker, who would narrow the gap between himself and his opponents to five just 12 minutes later.

There was again a degree of luck to Kane’s second and the host’s third, as he broke their club Premier League scoring record, previously held by Teddy Sheringham, with a scuffed effort that looked to have been unintentionally deflected goalward off his studs. Obviously not satisfied with a scoreline inflated by two moments of good fortune, Tottenham then put a final stamp on their superiority with an excellent team goal that started with Kane holding the ball up near the halfway line, and ended with Dele Alli back-heeling the ball into the path of Christian Eriksen. There was no doubting the outcome as the Dane stepped into a sharp side-footed finish which left Pickford fishing the ball out of his net for the fourth time, and had the travelling Evertonians once again walking away from Wembley with the sinking feeling that nothing good is ever going to happen there. Woodison South it is not.

Skies never look greyer than when a number of what Farhad ‘Sam Hammam’ Moshiri would term ‘expected losses’ come along at once, and now it’s up to Allardyce to draw a line under this terrible run and focus on the fairly winnable games ahead. What little hope he has of remaining in post beyond the summer will all but vanish if the team doesn’t look convincing against the likes of Saturday’s opponents West Brom, who will be confident of leaving Walton with at least a point after picking up their first win under (I’m) Alan Pardew, and so Old Fat Head better hope that his infectious brand of wool banter is still potent enough to elicit a major response from this group of born losers. Given his reputation as a fire fighter, and the fact that a seven-point gap between Everton and 18^th-placed Stoke is much bigger than it looks, you would have to hope that, regardless of any further additions to the squad, relegation won’t be a concern by the time spring rolls around; but still, sign a left-back, yeah?

A Time for Worship

The festive period has come and gone; and with it, the honeymoon period of Everton’s latest marriage of convenience has given way to abject familiarity.

In the month or so since the Mersey minnows had the audacity to rock up in front of Big Stand and refuse to simply let their esteemed hosts win, the frantic fixture schedule has provided a large enough sample size to afford Evertonians a comprehensive crash course on all things Sam Allardyce. The ‘new manager bounce’ continued, in terms of results at least, all through December, beginning with a first away win since Vietnam up at St James’ Park, which was followed by a solid if unspectacular home victory over Swansea. Fans’ enthusiasm then started to wane a little bit after unabashedly dull displays in a pair of goalless draws against Chelsea and West Brom, before it was back to working out exactly how long Big Sam’s big contract has left to run in the wake of a pitiful defeat at Nice Guy Eddie Howe’s Bournemouth.

It’s sixteen months, by the way.

Much like Ronald Koeman in his first season, Allardyce will be glad that he was given the opportunity to get a few points on the board early in his reign, as recent weeks have seen this Everton team found wanting in the face of stiff opposition once again. Playing a Manchester United side that hasn’t been out of the top four all season was obviously going to be difficult, but you still expect to muster a shot on target – especially under the lights at Goodison. The game served as yet another stark reminder that while Wayne Rooney will look good against any Fabianists that simply want to camp on the edge of their own box and wait for the Blues to do something stupid, he doesn’t actually know how to play centre midfield, and will always end up looking like an idiot when asked to compete against serious outfits that mean to compete all over the park. Also of note was the return of Yannick Bolasie to the starting lineup, just over twelve months after Anthony Martial put him on the weights in last season’s corresponding fixture. The Congo international isn’t to everyone’s taste – certainly not mine – but it appears as though his wild, unpredictable style is very much suited to Allardyce’s gravy-soaked palate.

Having said all that, it’s hardly time to go full Palermo and ask any available managers to send their CVs to Jim White. It bears repeating that this lot were well and truly Championship-bound under the respective stewardship of both Koeman and Coach Rhinoceros, and would have almost certainly been on the end of a scoreline that would make Roberto Martinez blush in one or both of the recent Anfield derbies had either of those two remained in charge. The FA Cup defeat was obviously frustrating, but it was still a marked improvement on the league performance, doing enough to at least test the conviction of those of us who have come away from past beatings insisting that all we want to see is a willingness to stand up and show some modicum of fight. Despite the embarrassing ramblings of newly outed lunatic Farhad Moshiri, who thought it wise to compare Liverpool’s ‘Fab Four’ to Everton’s own musical quartet – featuring Rooney as Vegas era Elvis, and Bolasie as the Tupac hologram – this remains an extremely limited group of players, assembled with such a lack of care that Leighton Baines’ injury has left the manager unable to field a left-footed player; and so it’s probably unreasonable to expect Allardyce to have achieved much more than mid-table mediocrity comes the season’s end.

With the team restored to something approaching the Moyes average of being able to beat the dross of the league at home, and at least making a show out of mostly losing on the road, the manager’s future could well depend on how successfully he traverses this January transfer window. There have already been significant, if extremely inevitable, departures in the form of Ross Barkley’s £15m transfer to Chelsea, and a loan deal which saw Kevin Mirallas finally going back from whence he came; meanwhile, German-born Turkey striker Cenk Tosun’s £25m move from Besiktas represents the first of hopefully several new arrivals. Barkley and Mirallas were both good value during their spells here, with the former showing glimpses of genuine greatness after breaking into the first team as a teenager under Martinez, and the latter always carrying a goal threat despite never really recapturing the form he showed before an embarrassing penalty debacle in January 2015.

Whereas it’s easy to spot exactly where Mirallas’ Everton career began its downward trajectory, it’s unlikely that we’ll ever discover the truth behind Barkley’s decision to basically do a Steve McManaman on the club that had been his home since childhood. For all of his obvious attributes as a footballer, something about the mercurial midfielder has rubbed virtually every club and international manager he’s ever had the wrong way; and so it does make you wonder why it’s only really Martinez and his inexhaustible supply of empty platitudes that has ever been able to coax a consistent response out of him. From a fan perspective, it’s always sad to see a quality player leave – especially one who grew up before our eyes as an academy graduate – but between the length of his contract saga and the eight months since his last appearance in a blue shirt, it almost feels like he left ages ago anyway. Whether it was all prompted by Koeman’s aloofness or the shame of being put on roller skates by a single uppercut, no one knows; and to be honest, it doesn’t matter. Chances are that his agent simply knew that if he signed a long-term contract at Everton, he’d be stuck here due to the prohibitive price that any potential suitors would have to pay to get him out it.

Barkley definitely has the talent to succeed at an elite club, but with the mental fragility he’s shown at times in his career, you do have to wonder how he’ll hold up under far greater media scrutiny; and that's without considering the pressure of working with a manager who doesn’t often credit underperforming players with showing phenomenal arrogance or having incredible moments of intensity.

Whatever the case, fuck him.

Liverpool 1 Everton 1

Veni, vidi, trahere.

Sam Allardyce’s first Merseyside derby ended in a 1-1 draw, thanks to a late penalty from Wayne Rooney that almost caused Jurgen Klopp to spit out his new teeth and rip the This is Anfield doormat off his frazzled bonce.

There were raised eyebrows when Marbella’s finest decreed that Everton would play four-four-fucking-two, and but for the hubris of his opposite number – who saw fit to leave Philippe Coutinho, Roberto Firmino, Emre Can and Georginio Wijnaldum on the bench ahead of a visit from West Brom on Wednesday – a ragtag band of defenders, thrown together through a combination of injury and appalling recruitment, could well have been served a hiding of Roberto Martinez proportions. Fortunately, though, the tricky Reds had decidedly bigger fish to fry, and so a backline comprised of Jonjoe Kenny, Ashley Williams, Mason Holgate and Cuco Martina was enough to restrict the scoreline to a point where the Blues were only a moment of fortune or quality away from being right back in the match.

A midfield four of Rooney, Tom Davies, Idrissa Gana Gueye and Gylfi Sigurdsson were predictably overran from the get-go, leaving Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Oumar Niasse to feed off scraps up front. According to those nerds at Opta, Everton had a lower share of the ball (21%) than they'd managed in any other Premier League game since records began in 2003/04 – suggesting that rather than bleat about penalties that even Mark Clattenburg would struggle to wave away, Klopp and his minions would be better served asking why they weren’t out of sight after an opening 45 minutes which saw Big Sam’s merry mob give a performance befitting a League Two team hoping to steal an FA Cup replay (more on that in January).

With little to suggest that the defensive personnel had, as Mick Foley would say, the intestinal fortitude to withstand a prolonged siege, there was more than a touch of the inevitable about Mohamed Salah’s quite sublime strike on 42 minutes. The Egyptian broke the deadlock – and, we all assumed, the floodgates – as he took the ball down under what first appeared to be pressure from Martina, only for it to transpire that Ronald Koeman had detonated his compatriot’s internal explosives, causing him to collapse in on himself like Tower 7. Salah then somehow managed to momentarily freeze Gana in time, before curling a peach of a shot around Williams and well beyond the reach of Jordan Pickford. The game should have been dead and buried minutes later when Sadio Mane found himself with a clear run on goal and both Dominic Solanke and Salah free to tap into a virtually empty net, but the Senegalese forward, who scored in both meetings last season, contrived to screw and awful shot past the far post.

Liverpool continued to dominate possession in the second half, but as time wore on, Everton started to look more comfortable in what was an unashamedly ultra-defensive shape, to the point where you felt that they were now confident in their ability to repel attacks from their base on the 18-yard line. Were it any other team in any other game, you would have suspected that the hosts could end up ruing the chances they had spurned earlier on; especially when Klopp doubled down on his contemptuous approach by withdrawing top-scorer Salah in the 67^th minute, despite his team’s narrow advantage, and the fact that they were being largely restricted to half-chances and efforts from outside the box. As it happened, not even an excruciatingly poor record on this ground was enough to stop that familiar pattern from playing out in Everton’s favour.

The plaudits will rightly go to the defence, with Kenny in particular giving a fantastic performance, but it was a rare moment of quality that truly earned the point. Rooney, who was much more useful following half-time changes that allowed him to move inside, gathered the ball out on the right-wing, near the halfway line, and picked out Calvert-Lewin with a perfectly-weighted, raking pass that dropped just over the head of the last defender, Dejan Lovren. The young striker showed tremendous skill and composure to watch the ball onto his thigh, and then move in behind the Croatian lump, who took it upon himself to shove his opponent with the impudence of someone facing a team that has been awarded but a single penalty at Anfield since the fall of well-known red Adolf Hitler.

Unfortunately for Lovren (and Hitler’s ghost), big Craig Pawson was there to chew bubblegum and give stonewall penalties – and he was all out of bubblegum. The whistle was blown, and in the absence of Leighton Baines it was Rooney who took responsibility and smashed his spot kick hard and high up the middle. Klopp responded by finally sending on Coutinho, but it proved to be too little, too late, as a rear-guard boosted by the addition of Phil Jagielka managed to hold out for an extremely unexpected point. It was initially insulting when the Sky commentator claimed that a draw would represent bragging rights for little Everton, but then it turned out that he was correct, as the freezing Toffees were warmed by the greatest prize of all: Klopp having another one of his Basil Fawlty meltdowns after someone didn’t let him win.

What a tit.

Welcome to the Big Sam Penitentiary

He’s here.

It’s said that a week is a long time in football, but perhaps not long enough for Evertonians to complete all five stages of grief following the appointment of one of the game’s longest-running memes as manager.

In fairness to le Grand Samuel, his arrival appears to have been the catalyst for a marked improvement in a team that was sleepwalking towards a relegation battle before picking up six points in the space of a week. Those back to back wins, which saw the Blues leapfrog their recent molesters Southampton into 10th place, have led some to question the necessity of caving into the demands of a manager whose record hardly befits the exorbitant wages and brown envelope bonuses that Farhad Moshiri has agreed to part with; and yet despite the obvious merits to these arguments, there’s no getting away from the fact that the search for Ronald Koeman’s replacement had become nothing short of an embarrassment, or that the longer it was allowed to rumble on, the more brazen this toxic set of players would have been in their resolve to down tools on hapless caretaker manager, David Unsworth.

After seeing his once-burgeoning reputation take something of a hit during the course of his spell in temporary charge, it was nice that poor old Coach Rhinoceros was able to sign off with an emphatic four-nil victory over a pitiful West Ham United. The game will forever be remembered as Wayne Rooney’s very own Gazza vs. Leyton Orient, as the de facto captain scored his first hat-trick since the Bootle brass houses stopped doing Black Friday - a treble which included a Goal of the Season candidate from inside his own half, following a piece of trademark idiocy from Joe Hart. It was a far from perfect performance, with the Hammers pinning Everton back for long periods of the second half and going so close as to miss a penalty, awarded after Ashley Williams - whose by any means necessary approach to conceding goals has earned him the nickname Malcolm Why? - made an even dafter attempt at winning the ball than the one he came up with against Atalanta.

The mini-revival continued three days later, when Jurgen Klopp’s somehow even weirder mate, David Wagner, brought his promoted Huddersfield Town to Fortress Woodison. Rooney was again deployed in a deeper midfield role alongside Idrissa Gana Gueye and Tom Davies, with Aaron Lennon, Gylfi Sigurdsson and Dominic Calvert-Lewin making up a much more balanced front three than what we’ve become accustomed to seeing. While I can’t say that I’m convinced that the Rooney experiment won’t come a cropper against better sides who will push the tempo and have runners swarming all over him, it certainly made a difference having someone who is willing to put his foot on the ball and pick the kind of incisive passes that have enabled Lennon to become more of a potent weapon than he has been since his initial loan spell in 2015. Sigurdsson is another who has looked far better with Rooney in behind him, making it all the more interesting to see how this new system fares against Liverpool’s famous gegenfoul on Sunday.

While it’s obviously too early to start talking about anything beyond increasing the breathing space between themselves and the teams that look ready to be cut adrift down at the bottom, there does at last seem to be cause for cautious optimism within the club. Calvert-Lewin showed again against Huddersfield that he’s already good enough to provide cover for whoever ends up being Allardyce’s choice to lead the line on a more regular basis, and regardless of the fact that they both came against limited opposition, keeping consecutive clean sheets with a defence featuring Cuco Martina at left-back is certainly no mean feat. There are, quite understandably, plenty of misgivings over developments such as Anfield gremlin Sammy Lee - who at least had the decency not to turn up in the My Cousin Vinny suit that he wore while prowling the touchline at Bolton - and Craig ‘et tu?’ Shakespeare rocking up with Old Fat ‘Ead, but those will quickly be forgotten if results continue to improve.

Being the pragmatist that he is, you would think that Allardyce will be happy to just get out of dodge without being humiliated when he takes charge of his first Merseyside derby at the weekend. The tricky Reds are likely to be flying after securing their place in the Champions League knockout rounds thanks to a seven-nil mauling of Spartak Moscow, and to be honest, the thought of Mohamed Salah or Saido Mane running at a wrong-footed Martina doesn’t exactly fill one with confidence. Hopefully, after seeing them wallop Brighton and now Spartak, and letting their fans fill their boots with quips about the new Everton manager’s rare blood type OXO, Satan will have exhausted his powers for the week, and the match will be something of a fair contest.

Ha!

I am Sam

I sense something - a presence I’ve not felt since…

… whenever the last time Everton were genuinely at risk of being relegated.

That’s how Darth Vader would have finished his sentence, were he an Evertonian living in 2017. Luckily for him, though, the Sith were most assuredly Liverpool fans, who would be looking forward to watching Mo Salah and friends realise that yes, it really is as easy as running quickly in a straight line, when Sporting Club Big Stand host the Merseyside derby in a fortnight’s time.

To say that things have gone from bad to worse since the last update would be quite an understatement. Coach Rhinoceros followed the fortuitous win over Watford with a decent, if again somewhat lucky, draw at Selhurst Park, where they were largely outplayed by Roy Hodgson’s bottom-of-the-table Crystal Palace. The game was a memorable one, as in addition to the Blues holding out for a point that could prove invaluable come the end of the season, there was also another entry added to the long list of Everton firsts, with Oumar Niasse becoming the first player to run afoul of the FA’s new anti-diving laws; which allow for retroactive punishment in the event that a player successfully swindles a referee into awarding a penalty. The Senegalese forward was judged to have ‘exaggerated normal contact’ when demonstrating his judo break falling technique after colliding with Scott Dann.

In one of the more inexplicable developments that the alternate timeline we’re living in has thrown up, Niasse is now effectively Everton’s best player, and so it came as no surprise when his absence meant a complete lack of goal threat in the two games that followed. The first - a 1-5 drubbing at the hands of middling Italian outfit Atalanta - was effectively a club-imposed suspension, dealt to him on the grounds that Ronald Koeman didn’t know how to spell his name, and couldn’t for the life of him get his 4G going out on the fourteenth hole. Erwin could barely send a text, never mind get Google up, so in the end it was left to STRIKER TBC to lead the line in what will likely be the last European fixture seen at Woodison for a good long while.

Of all the trappings of wealth that the club is now enjoying, perhaps the most satisfying is the freedom to rotate a large, expensively assembled squad. Whereas many of the league’s lesser lights would be forced to watch helplessly as a taxing Thursday-Sunday schedule derailed their domestic campaign, David Unsworth - whose stewardship has felt longer than Denethor II’s rule over Gondor - had the luxury of resting most of his first choice players ahead of a lunchtime trip to Southampton. The decision paid dividends, as the fresh legs proved enough to not only prolong a routine humiliation until after half-time, but even score a goal in the process. In fairness to Gylfi Sigurdsson, it was a hell of a strike; and for a brief moment he looked as though he was able to forget that he had somehow found himself playing for the only team in the division worse than Swansea.

It was a very brief moment, though.

It’s during these times of strife that you wonder why the national press pays such little attention to goings on in L4, as there really is no circus like an Everton circus. Many, myself included, mistook the prompt sacking of Koeman as a demonstration of authority and ambition from majority shareholder Farhad Moshiri, only for it to soon become apparent that the board had absolutely no clue what their next move was. Rumours of a rift between Moshiri and chairman Bill Kenwright have been circulating for a number of weeks, centring on the former’s alleged desire to appoint from a list of candidates whose opinion of the club is likely to be as withering as Koeman’s was, and the latter wanting to basically get some big fat wool in. Steve Walsh has also resurfaced, now that it’s finally cold enough to break out the rather fetching pair of leather gloves that he bought during his summer sojourn in Milan.

After a fruitless pursuit of Watford boss Marco Silva, the battle lines are well and truly drawn. Moshiri and the gang are said to have re-opened talks with Sam Allardyce today (Monday 27), but with a number of old media allies being wheeled out to condemn the parody-voiced Iranian, you begin to wonder if he’s about to get the Paul Gregg treatment. There are few forces in football more powerful than the Kenwright propaganda machine, and once it’s got you in its cross hairs, it’s only a matter of time before the tide is turned with stories of remortgaging houses, and taking an uncle’s errant handlebars up the bum after going over a pothole on County Road. Unexpected additions to the tried and tested script have come in the form of Liverpool fan Don Hutchison, who thinks that relegation is acceptable on the basis that Kenwright was said to be unwell two years ago, and humble street philosopher Joseph Barton, who is reliably informed that Kenwright is actually stronger than ever, thanks to a spirit cooking regimen which involves feasting on the pineal glands of discarded youth team players.

There does come a point where you have to accept that this whole ‘nothing will ever be the same’ thing was simply a long con joke. The punch line will be revealed on the final day of the season when, after David Moyes has had his revenge, Jim White receives one last call from the lad who does a Bane impersonation while pretending to be Moshiri.

‘I know you’re a very busy man, Farhad, so I’ll cut to the chase. What our listeners want to know is, now that Everton have been consigned to the Championship, can they still be considered a big club?’

‘For you.’

Everton 3 Watford 2

'Chaos is a ladder.' - Petyr Baelish

David Unsworth recorded his fist victory as interim manager, beating Watford 3-2 in front of a Goodison Park crowd that was well and truly put through the Everton wringer.

Having consulted the I Ching and been advised that in order to go around, one must go through, Unsworth abandoned all semblance of width; picking Beni Baningime, Idrissa Gana Gueye, Tom Davies, Wayne Rooney and Gylfi Sigurdsson in what must have been the narrowest formation since King Leonidas went to the Thermopylae pass looking for a point. Phil Jagielka took over from Ashley Williams in the role of defender who the opposition targets mercilessly, starting alongside Jonjoe Kenny, Michael Keane and an increasingly creaking Leighton Baines, with Jordan Pickford in goal and Oumar Niasse leading the line as only he can.

The first half was predictably dire, as the Blues moved forward with a tentativeness that spoke to a subconscious fear that in the likely event of an attack breaking down, there was no chance of anyone catching the visitors' rapid front three if they should break away on the counter. The best example of this came when Jagielka attempted to get touch-tight to Andre Gray, only to be rolled with the kind of ease that match-fixing allegations are made of. This led to a straight foot race between Pickford and Richarlison in which there was only ever going to be one winner, but thankfully the otherwise excellent Brazilian shot wide of an empty net after running beyond the stranded goalkeeper.

With the only meaningful chance of the first half having fallen somewhat fortuitously to Baines, it was surprising to see the team emerge unchanged after the break. Less surprising, however, was the continuation of this season's theme of not only failing to learn from mistakes, but repeating them at the nearest opportunity. This episode featured Jagielka inexplicably trying to get up Gray's arse again, getting rolled again, and Richarlison scoring after Rooney allowed Kiko Femenia to pick up a poor clearance and feed the ball back into the box; lighting the touch paper for one of the maddest halves in recent memory.

After Christian Kabasele put the Hornets into what looked to be an unassailable 2-0 lead - heading in unmarked from a corner, naturally - Niasse took the call for a return of the Dogs of War spirit a bit too literally, deciding that the best course of action was to injure visiting goalkeeper Heurelho Gomes, and thus force Marco Silva to send on hopeless backup Orestis Karneziz. The Black Mamba's trap was set, and it wasn't long before his unorthodox approach to pressing again paid dividends, as he pounced on a moment of hesitation between Karneziz and Miguel Britos. Honestly, watching him play, it's almost as though the last thing that Premier League centre halves expect to encounter is an opponent running his hardest at every turn.

Everton drew level seven minutes later through substitute Dominic Calvert-Lewin's unchallenged header from a Baines corner, and for the first time in what felt like forever, Goodison was very much rocking again; and you dared wonder if there could be light at the end of the tunnel when, with normal time almost up, Jose Holebas slipped over in front of Aaron Lennon and referee Graham Scott blew for a penalty. Having already produced a dangerous set-piece delivery that led directly to a goal, Baines again rolled back the years by burying his spot-kick beyond the reach of the debuting goalkeeper - who for all the piss-taking actually made a valiant attempt at getting a glove on the ball.

The 12 minutes of stoppage time that resulted from injuries to Gomes and Kabasele suddenly didn't look so appealing, and it was with some degree of inevitability that Everton contrived to concede a penalty of their own at the opposite end. 'We're going down,' was the consensus when Richarlison picked up the ball, but then former blue boo boy Tom Cleverley pulled rank as Watford captain for the day, and proceeded to take one of the jargest penalties this side of Fiorentina 2008.

Absolute farce.

Leicester City 2 Everton 0

Two games in, and already the white rhinoceros is in danger of becoming extinct.

Hot on the heels of a midweek League Cup exit at Stamford Bridge - a result that Farhad Moshiri would likely file under ‘expected defeat’ - David Unsworth led his band of assorted misfits to the King Power Stadium, where Leicester City treated their new head honcho Claude Puel to a perfect first day on the job.

The Temporary Manager Formerly Known as Keep it on the Floor, you Yard Dog persisted with the same setup that had shown promise in spells against Chelsea, with Jonjoe Kenny, Ashley Williams, Phil Jagielka and Leighton Baines making up a back four in front of Jordan Pickford; and a midfield three of Idrissa Gana Gueye, Tom Davies and Wayne Rooney supporting Aaron Lennon, Kevin Mirallas and Dominic Calvert-Lewin in attack. To his credit, Unsworth appeared to have taken on board some of the stinging criticism levelled at his wardrobe choices on Wednesday night, instead opting to honour the sabbath and dig out his best West Derby Village gear.

Despite hints of pathos in his voice that suggest a very real possibility of things going from bad to John Carver, Unsworth gave himself every chance of banking a fair amount of goodwill with the fans by actually selecting two natural wingers in a formation that, up until recently, had always been employed with the express purpose of providing width. The decision looked to have been vindicated, judging by the fact that the handful of goalscoring opportunities that Everton created in the first half all came from either a penetrating run by Lennon or a shot coming in off the left flank by Mirallas; but apparently Unsworth himself disagreed, as evidenced by the inexplicable decision to hook the pair of them at half-time.

The Blues were, of course, already two-nil down by that point, having conceded in the 18th minute, when Demarai Gray turned defence into attack with the type of blistering run that no one plying their trade in L4 seems capable of. Gathering the ball from a clearance following yet another poor Everton set-piece, he first made a complete mug of Davies, knocking the ball well past him and then shrugging off a pathetic attempt at a foul, before leaving Gueye sprawled on his arse and then putting Rooney in the difficult position of having to decide whether to take his booking early, or save it for later on, when he’d be properly knackered. Mr Winning Mentality went for the latter, allowing Gray to slip in Riyad Mahrez, who in turn crossed low for Jamie Vardy to fire high into Pickford’s net.

Two decent long-range efforts from Mirallas aside, Everton looked at their most dangerous on the occasions where Lennon was able to use his pace to exploit the space in between Leicester’s three central defenders and left wing-back. In the first instance, he got on the end of a lovely through ball by Rooney and showed excellent composure to hang on long enough to draw Kasper Schmeichel off his line, only to see his low centre find Calvert-Lewin flat-footed and roll harmlessly away. The same chink in the home side’s armour would be exploited again shortly after, but this time Lennon was unfortunate not to be awarded a penalty, with referee Andre Mariner failing to point to the spot after the winger was brought down from behind by the trailing leg of Christian Fuchs.

It wouldn’t be long before the home side’s lead was doubled, thanks to a lapse in concentration that young Kenny will hope to soon forget. Gray was again the architect, this time popping up on the left-hand side, and then cutting in and firing a tame effort that would have been unlikely to trouble the Everton goal, were it not for Kenny taking a wild swing and deflecting the ball high beyond Pickford’s reach. It was the type of goal that would have been a sickener at the best of the times, but during a run where even a one-nil deficit looks a near-insurmountable obstacle, it felt like the game was dead and buried after less than half an hour.

Remembering all that he’d learned from Ronald Koeman, Unsworth made two substitutions at the break, taking off Lennon and Mirallas for Oumar Niasse and Beni Baningime. The changes represented, theoretically at least, a switch to a midfield diamond, but in practice it was basically Davies playing down the right and no left-winger. Harsh though it may be, the sad truth is that as the second half wore on, and the desired shape and strategy appeared less and less clear, it became obvious that Unsworth isn’t long for the role. It’s one thing to come in and play the good cop for an end of season dead rubber, as he did with aplomb at the end of Martinez’s reign in 2016; but I’m afraid the task at hand is something all together more challenging. Barring a remarkable turnaround in France on Thursday, you’d have to imagine that he’ll be back with the under-23s after Watford’s visit on Sunday.

While it should be noted that sitting in the relegation zone after 10 games is hardly unchartered waters for Everton, it’s been a long time since the club has faced the uncertainty of looking for a new manager with around three-quarters of the season still to play. The David Moyes who used to drag the club out of such patches through sheer force of will simply does not exist anymore, and of those who have been tentatively linked, none really jump out as an ideal candidates for both the long and short-term; and that’s without mentioning the risk of allowing the same group that were responsible for the summer transfer disaster to make yet another vital decision.

Dark times indeed.