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| Fucking ace |
Whatever his motives, the gist is once again what is needed to get the Toffees to the much-vaunted 'next level' - ie fourth.
Unfortunately, as Moyes says, no one is going to drive past Goodison and sling a bag of readies in at reception with a note saying "get yourself something nice" in return for nowt.
So it doesn't really mean anything when he says: "Everton could be very close to being very good for not an awful lot of outlay. It might not be one of those clubs that needs £300million-£400million to turn it around."
Everton might "only" need, say, £50m to make a real difference but as it stands it might as well be £500m, because it isn't going to happen.
No one's going to "invest" in Everton because they're not going to get any money back - we're looking for someone happy to throw money away. Or as someone put it on a supporters' website: "We need a pissed up warlord who's trying to stash some blood diamond money."
As Moyes says, new money tends to come with new owners. But he's wrong when he says the ownership at Everton isn't the problem. Not necessarily because Bill Kenwright hasn't sold up, if no one's come in to buy him out there's really no argument there.
It's the way Everton is perceived which is the problem, and that comes from the top of the club. Over the last 15 years or so Everton have somehow managed to make themselves a "considering" club.
We do well:
considering the lack of money.
The injuries
The lack of facilities at Goodison
The lack of money
The poor start to the season
Because of the injuries
Considering the small squad
Which is down the lack of money
These things get trotted out when discussing Everton as a matter of course and have become accepted. How can it be "just the way it is" for Everton to start every single season shite?
There's no witchcraft involved so what's to blame? Things don't just happen, except cause and effect. As for our strong finish to the season when there's once again fuck all to play for, does anyone really give a shit about finishing ahead of Liverpool when there are plenty of other teams who will do that too?
But you can't get away from the money issue. Everton as a club is improving commercially - you can see that all over - but there are still problems, like when they run out of ale at half time.
They only play at Goodison about once a fortnight - running out of beer is inexcusable. The place has been there for nearly 120 years, working to roughly the same timetable - you can't be surprised when a crowd shows up.
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| Hyped |
Some people say, shift one and settle some of the debt. But the problem is we're losing money every year, so this plan relies on Moyes selling quite a few Rodwells and Fellainis over the next few years, while still building a team.
Then there's the season ticket money for the next few years which the club has already spent. So how do we plug that hole? Or do we keep borrowing against it, driving up interest payments as we go?
If we sell Fellaini or Rodwell, and I'd be amazed if we don't, then there's a real danger we'll be doing it merely to stand still. And then Kenwright will have trouble because surely Moyes will walk, if he doesn't this summer. Yes, he's on a good screw but the contract chucked at Alan Pardew by Newcastle suggests there's still plenty of money in top level togger managing.
On the stadium issue - and whatever your sympathies, Kenwright has been involved in two fuck ups there - Moyes suggests redeveloping Goodison, possibly one stand at a time, but again money is the issue.
He mentions Blackburn's recent takeover and says "they have a stadium that’s already in place" as a factor in that deal. And yes they do, but compared to Goodison it's shit. There's no comparison between the two but many people won't see it that way because of their perception of Everton.
And that is what needs to change. How? Fuck knows. We've got some good players and Moyes says “that’s maybe why we don’t need a zillionaire.” But he's wrong. Look at some of the players recently tied to long deals - Phil Jagielka (28), Mikel Arteta (29), Tim Cahill (31) - three key players on presumably big money. None of whom, if they see half of their deals out, is going to have any real sell-on value. How do we replace them?
A zillionaire is exactly what we need. Someone with the money to buy a team to compete at the very top - like what's happening at Manchester City.
But assuming we still need to build a stadium, the danger is we're going to need a mere billionaire - or at least someone with a lot of millions - just to keep the team where we are now.
