The NSNO Everton Forums

TheRam wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 9:50 am I don’t think people want him to be creative.

More that people want him to progress the ball a lot better.

Quick passes through the lines, switches of play, stuff like that.

He’s still really bad at that part of the game.

Hit a beautiful low stinger cross field pass yesterday... He's got it in him, and he does occasionally show it. Just needs to kick on with that side of things, but we've seen his development this season in other areas and I think it might just be one of those things where a bit of development will unlock it more often.

I'd be more worried if he never did it, but he does sometimes... Leicester last season, Forest this season, Villa yesterday. If he improves on that and we as a team improve it's a great platform moving forward.

brap2 wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 9:59 am Wait who's saying get rid?

You were talking about a gravy train earlier implying we should cash in - reality is that we'd get max £40m for him and I don't trust us to bring in a replacement who is the same level.

We can't be replacing the whole club as much as some people seem to want to - Pickford, JOB, Brantwaite, Tarks, Garner, Rohl, Armstrong, Dibling, N'diaye, Barry is a core that needs to stay and we can improve around them

TheRam wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 9:50 am I don’t think people want him to be creative.

More that people want him to progress the ball a lot better.

Quick passes through the lines, switches of play, stuff like that.

He’s still really bad at that part of the game.

QED

StirlingBlue wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 12:08 pm You were talking about a gravy train earlier implying we should cash in - reality is that we'd get max £40m for him and I don't trust us to bring in a replacement who is the same level.

We can't be replacing the whole club as much as some people seem to want to - Pickford, JOB, Brantwaite, Tarks, Garner, Rohl, Armstrong, Dibling, N'diaye, Barry is a core that needs to stay and we can improve around them

There's clear semantic differences between bin him off and cash in on the big fat gravy train IMO

brap2 wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 9:59 am Wait who's saying get rid?

His barber, hopefully.

brap2 wrote: ↑Sun Jan 18, 2026 8:52 pm Yeah these are the games you really appreciate him and he's a genuinely great option.

Low possession, low touches, work on hard, run them socks off, read the game well and compete in the middle.

Quality on the ball from deep for me is lacking. He very rarely switches it, he very rarely changes the tempo, he very rarely sprays a ball over the top.

But he does keep it moving and allows us to keep the ball which is valuable, and he can put a really nice ball into the box.

I think you forget we're a very defensive side and whose he going to spray the ball over the top to? BETO ? barry as was ? Again with the switching the ball ndiaye yes... lays it off to jack probably more than anyone...

I dont get it a "great option" ....
"Low possession, low touches, work on hard, run them socks off, read the game well and compete in the middle"

."But he does keep it moving and allows us to keep the ball which is valuable, and he can put a really nice ball into the box"

What more do you want from a holding midfielder? bit contradictory there....

MmmBlueBranthwaite wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 12:35 pm QED

In fairness that was 100% a great demonstration of forward progressive passing, cross, tackling and ball carrying.

These distilled views of a specific player's touches in a game are really useful, especially when you have the attention span of a goldfish over 90 minutes, like I do.

It’s all the more impressive when you hears stat like he hit defcon 29 yesterday.

With defcon being defensive contributions.

Might be a little late, but Tuchel probably is a fan of that sort of contribution.

May have an outside of chance of a call up?

MmmBlueBranthwaite wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 12:35 pm QED

Yeah you’d be into it if you’d heard we were trying to get this dm for £20m who’d played like that in his last game

Time we all agreed he's a good player, and move on to the next whipping boy.

See you in the mykolenko thread.

The Doc wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 8:43 pm Time we all agreed he's a good player, and move on to the next whipping boy.

Agree, there have been some bizarre shouts about the lad.

Escalator wrote: ↑Mon Jan 19, 2026 9:24 pm Agree, there have been some bizarre shouts about the lad.

I agree, but people get excited when one of our players is playing well, and he absolutely is playing well. He's having a great season. We shouldn't hold it against anyone who goes OTT.