Although there appears to be a unanimous consensus that David Moyes was rightfully appointed as the next Manchester United boss, being in style, nationality and manner a natural successor to Sir Alex Ferguson, there is still a hint of sadness and sympathy regarding the Scot’s decision to leave behind his former club, Everton.
Being a distant admirer of the Toffees and a self proclaimed Everton enthusiast, in no small part due to their continual defiance of resources and finance, there is a concern that this will be the end of the Merseyside outfit as we know it, with a number of the club’s key figures, namely Marouane Fellaini and Leighton Baines, being linked with moves away from Goodison Park in the summer, in addition to David Moyes’ tenure being an incredibly difficult act to follow.
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It could well be a turning point for better or worse in the club’s history, and success and failure over the course of the next few years at Goodison will undoubtedly depend on Bill Kenwright’s next managerial appointment. Whilst a number of British-born candidates have been shortlisted for the role, including Malky Mackay, Neil Lennon and Phil Neville, there are also a fair few foreign managers being considered by the Everton chairman, such as Roberto Martinez, Gus Poyet and Porto’s Vito Pereira, who over the past few days has become one of the front runners according to the bookies.
It begs the question as to whether Everton should go British or foreign with their next appointment, and what implications it will have for the club on and off the pitch in the years to come.
Foreign managerial influence is rife in the Premier League, and I would argue that overall the English top flight is much better for it. The type of football we have witnessed from Swansea and Wigan this season, taking clear influences from the styles and in the former’s case the personnel of La Liga, has been enriching and fantastic to watch, creating fixtures between clubs of sharp contrast with typically English teams such as West Ham, Stoke, Sunderland and Norwich.
Both philosophies of play have their strengths and weaknesses, yet it has undoubtedly improved the English game in general, and even our bigger clubs such as Chelsea, Tottenham and Arsenal are now geared towards a more technical approach to their game.
Although other clubs such as Newcastle have been accused of their foreign influence taking away their identity, Swansea, Chelsea and Arsenal are all glowing examples that importing a style of play from outside of the English game can work if conducted effectively, and should Bill Kenwright appoint Roberto Martinez or Vito Pereira, you’d feel that both managers have enough ability, vision and proven track-record to make Goodison Park a fortress of continental flair.
Yet the transition to such a manner of play will undoubtedly take time, considering that David Moyes’ tactics and roster have been geared for over a decade towards playing the game in the English way – a combination of height, strength, power and ability on the ball to get results. Of course, it all depends upon the summer’s incomings and outgoings on the blue half of Merseyside, but you cannot imagine the likes of Marouane Fellaini, Victor Anichebe, Phil Jagielka or Johnny Heitinga readily and quickly adapting to a style of football that is South American or Spanish in its origins.
Furthermore, it is time that Everton arguably don’t have. I don’t wish to be accused of ‘scare-mongering’, but the fact is that the scope for failure is incredibly slim at Goodison Park. The finances remain continually tight, and with the summer marking the end of an era for the Toffees, one bad season or a false start could easily lead to a downward spiral for the club. David Moyes has already had the club and the players performing to a level beyond their means for some time, and any disruption to the squad’s intense bond, with the first team clearly better off as a whole in a well-oiled machine rather than being significantly talented as individuals, could trigger disaster.
Similarly, as mentioned previously, much has been made this season about striking the balance between home-grown talents and players imported from abroad. Currently the Toffees have 12 players in their registered 25 man squad born within the British Isles and Ireland, whilst many others, such as Tim Howard, Steven Pienaar, Victor Anichebe and Sylvain Distin have plied their trade in England for such a long time they have practically become English by association.
Everton’s successes under Moyes has been in no small part due to the roster’s overall strong familiarity with the style, quirks and methodologies of the Premier League, and should a new foreign manager come in, ripping apart this integral core to make space for flashy foreign footballers from abroad would almost certainly constitute as a grave error, favouring idealism over pragmatism.
But whether the next manager will undergo a policy of evolution or revolution will not necessarily depend on their nationality; Gus Poyet and Roberto Martinez may both hold foreign passports, yet both have spent the majority of their playing careers and the entirety of their management careers in England.
At Brighton and Wigan respectively, both have struck a balance between English physicality and South American flair, and given time they could replicate their feats at Everton. Despite the number of big lumps in the Toffees’ roster, there is similarly a contingent of players that possess no particular athleticism, but rely upon their technical abilities and more importantly their footballing brains, such as Steven Pienaar, Leighton Baines, Darron Gibson and Leon Osman.
Whether Bill Kenwright appoints a foreign manager or not, the key will be to provide longevity rather than bringing in a manager for the short-term. You’d argue that in terms of vision at least, thinking Spanish or continental would therefore be the way forward, as Roberto Martinez has proved during his tenure at Swansea and the legacy he left behind, that installing an ethos and philosophy creates a long-term success that surpasses the stay of any particular manager or player, no matter what their ability.
But in terms of consistency from one term to the next, it would appear that choosing a manager whose ideology is British in origin outweighs future visions of the club in terms of importance. There has always been a level of pragmatism and reliance upon knowledge of the English game behind David Moyes’ successes, and with the scope for wholesale change reasonably limited at Goodison Park, the next appointment does not have to be a carbon copy of the former Everton boss, but at least must share with him similar values.
Everton have an English core, English style and English identity, and foreign or not, the incoming manager must not compromise these pillars of the club’s triumphs over the last decade, however there are grounds to make subtle modifications and improvements to them, taking lessons from a more continental approach to the game.