OPINION
Steve McManaman dismissed the idea that Everton’s ambition to finish seventh in the Premier League wasn’t inspiring enough for the Toffees players and that this target was a reason for their poor form.
Jake Humphrey asked the BT Sport pundit whether the ambition for the Toffees to finish seventh was an issue as it was hardly a goal that was exciting for a bunch of players.
“Possibly, possibly, possibly, but that shouldn’t be an excuse you want to better yourselves, you want to do well, a lot of these players want to think they’re good enough to move on and go to better teams, so they’ve got all their personal pride to play for,” said McManaman on BT Sport, as seen in a clip on the broadcaster’s Twitter account.
“And at the moment I think 33 points is just a woeful, woeful number.”
McManaman is spot-on with verdict on the touted excuse for Everton’s recent poor form as if the players are that ambitious and want to achieve more than a seventh place finish, they should show it on the pitch.
No one at Goodison Park is going to complain if they finish higher than seventh and while that probably is the realistic target that was set for them ahead of the season, their attitude should be to defy expectations.
Also just like the former Liverpool player said if the Toffees’ current crop of players honestly feel their above targeting a seventh place finish, then they need to play in order to earn moves to so-called better teams.
It’s clear many Toffees fans will agree that players being uninspired over targeting a high-finish in the Premier League is an acceptable excuse for the club’s bad form, as they will no doubt point out how several players unperformed in the FA Cup against Millwall, which saw them crash out of the tournament.
If Toffees players really want more ambition from the club then the FA Cup surely should have been on their minds and in their sights, however they didn’t exactly play like they really want to lift the trophy this season.
While several high-profile Toffees such as Gylfi Sigurdsson and Theo Walcott are the among the culprits under-performing if Humphrey was right to suggest the excuse was to do with ambition, then they are the issue, not the club or Marco Silva.