The return to Premier League action after yet another of those interminable International breaks begins with Brentford making their final league trip to Goodison Park. Nick Bruzon previews.
Everton, of course, due to move out at the end of this season and start the next campaign in their new Waterfront stadium. Whatever division that may be in.
Please don’t @me, the table doesn’t lie. As it stands, another close encounter with The Championship (see also: last season, and the season before, and the one before that) is currently on the cards. Just three points separate the Toffees from the bottom three, with goal difference yet to yield any significant advantage in either direction.
This time around form has hardly been electric. There was that phase of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory as 2-0 leads were treated like a pair of worn-out underpants and simply thrown away with the rubbish.
Manager Sean Dyche has since stopped this nonsense of his team scoring actual goals, given the response it usually elicits, instead trading it for a series of not much. Only a win at Ipswich Town has cast any positivity from the last five games. As much because for once they went two up but then managed to retain the advantage.
That sequence of fixtures also including the reverse at divisional whipping boys Southampton, a 1-1 draw with Fulham and 0-0’s against both Newcastle United and West Ham. A game so devoid of quality it still hadn’t reached last up on Match Of The Day by the time Sunday morning’s repeat had come around.
All well and good except, of course, it doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes to see that Brentford on the road are a very different beast to the team in West London. Games at The Gtech see The Bees with 16 out of a possible 18 points earned. No Premier League side has performed better this season and this form has taken them to within touching distance of third-placed Chelsea on 19.
The fly in the ointment – albeit more a swarm – has been away from TW8 where the record reads LLLLL. Defeats to Liverpool, Man City, Spurs and Man U are hard enough but then compounded by that brutal sucker punch at Craven Cottage. Nobody needs a reminder of what happened then so we’ll all agree to move on.
Instead, perhaps, hope that the recent run of ‘injuries’ that forced Wissa (unspecified), Bryan Mbeumo (unspecified) and Ethan Pinnock (hip) to withdraw from international duty has come to an end. Fingers crossed that all three have ‘recovered’ and these ailments were not too serious.
Likewise, there’s talk that Igor Thiago could be in the matchday squad for Saturday. Something that, if it plays out, could be more than what the doctor ordered for Thomas Frank. The lack of an alternative option up top is something that was abundantly clear as we edged closer and closer to full-time at Fulham the other week.
At face value, it is a game with little to excite the neutral. Everton looking abject in most departments. Brentford’s away form being the stuff of bad dreams and, at least currently, containing ghoulish statistical interest.
Yet for those in the stands or following from home, the prospect is a different one.
Dyche is one of those managers you love to beat yet inevitably will turn out to be one of the hardest to get past. A curious mixture of Steve Evans and Russell Slade. Combing shouty bluster with intensity to create a team moulded in his own image. If not literally (something nobody needs to visualise) then certainly in character.
Counter that with Brentford’s current status as lovers of attacking and free-flowing football. Of dynamic pass and move. Of those well-documented fast starts that have seen numerous goals scored within moments of kick-off.
If both teams play to their full potential then it could be an absolute cracker played out in a highly charged atmosphere. A complete contrast of styles with Goodison in fine voice as the end edges ever closer. Add to that talk of a tenth-minute round of applause for Newcastle United’s Anthony Gordon after he scored a goal for England during the break (then again, who didn’t?) to further stoke it up a bit.
I’m still not sure if this is a genuine endeavour or a social media prank that has gone viral, given we’re talking about the same Anthony Gordon who looked to force his move away from Everton by refusing to turn up for training.
Go figure? Perhaps he took advice from Brentford’s former number 26? Football fans have long memories and, as with former favourites kissing the Loftus Road badge or claiming Birmingham City to be ‘ten times better’, his own decision not to play against Dyche and Burnley in 2016 before signing for them just two weeks later is one that still rankles even now.
If ever there was a motivating factor for Brentford fans to get behind the team and look to play their own part in picking up the first away points of the campaign then there it is.
Failing that, the prospect of a win and favourable results elsewhere could see The Bees in the Champions League places at 17:00 on Saturday afternoon. Something that should be more than sufficient incentive for players and supporters alike.
Please don’t @me, the table doesn’t lie.
