Everton have been a fully-fledged laughing stock over the last few years - and I don’t think there’s a football fan out there who doesn’t hope that the club’s new owners will finally give the Goodison fans something to smile about. Well, everywhere apart from Anfield!
But seriously, in recent seasons anything that could go wrong for the Toffees has gone wrong. Farhad Moshiri has spent a staggering £750million trying to awaken a sleeping giant - but he will leave behind a club that appears to be suffering from narcolepsy.
Of course, Mr Moshiri must shoulder much of the blame for failing to put a long-term plan in place when he first arrived on Merseyside in 2016. Everton have had some top-class managers during that time. Carlo Ancelotti, Roberto Martinez, Ronald Koeman, Rafa Benitez and Marco Silva all have impressive pedigrees.
But every time there has been a change in the hot-seat, it has been a case of rip it up and start again. Little wonder a fortune has been squandered.
There has also been some rank misfortune, as well. Ancelotti might have built something sustainable had Real Madrid made the Italian an offer he couldn’t refuse. Then Russia’s invasion of Ukraine led to the government freezing the assets of Alisher Usmanov - and not only had Moshiri lost his richest business partner, but the man who was financially backing the building of a new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock was out of the picture.
To add to the madness, Moshiri was unable to spend his way out of the now annual fight against relegation because of the Premier League’s new Profit and Sustainability Rules.
Let me be clear: I don’t see any business sense in not allowing someone who has spent an eye-watering fortune on a club being barred from investing further in the business. But that’s been Everton’s rotten luck - and when they were hauled up for breaking PSR, their initial punishment was pretty merciless.
If American tycoon Dan Friedkin passes the fit and proper person’s test as expected and seals his takeover at Everton, he will own a club that is once again on the slippery slope towards a fight for Premier League survival. This is Everton’s final season at Goodison before they leave the historic old ground for an iconic new home on the Liverpool waterfront. It would be tragic if they made the move as a Championship club.
Sean Dyche has managed to keep relegation outside the door in extremely testing circumstances. But he will be under even more pressure from day one when the Friedkin Group complete their takeover because going out of the Premier League is not an option for them.
It’s a fact of football life that new owners don’t need much of an excuse to appoint their own manager - but Sean will be well aware of that reality. It’s crazy to think that there are people in their 30s who won’t remember the last time Everton won a trophy.
When I was growing up in the 80s, Merseyside boasted the two best teams in the country and the so-called ‘School of Science’ at Goodison was something to be feared. But Everton haven’t won a trophy since lifting the 1995 FA Cup - and those members of my family who are of a Blue persuasion really have suffered enough.
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