Everton Success Due to this Key Philosophy of Koeman
Before the season started Everton entered one of the most important stages of it’s history, a change of ownership in an era of abundant money; now is the time to enter the elite. But transitions can be bumpy, and bumps can lead to crashes. Moshiri had to find a manager to steady the ship, and has most definitely found that in Ronald Koeman.
Not only has he settled Everton through a transition, he has done so while keeping the clubs ambitions high, making him the optimal choice for a club like us. Sure, Mouriniho might have won us the treble, but afterwards we would have crashed and burned, as can be the case with soaring success. Moshiri is looking for long-term success, which happens after you secure some form of stability and consistency. Which is a familiar pattern if we look at the key to Koeman’s success at Everton.
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Koeman’s philosophy has two core values: have plan’s A through F ready, and unlocking the stages of play. By the latter I mean Koeman only allows his players to be fluid after his core defensive tactics have been assured by positional play. We saw this at Southampton, if Van Dyke would go forward then either Clasie or Wanyama would be positioned to fall into centreback position should the opposition break.
We see it at Everton even more clearly, which I assume is due to having centrebacks who have tons of quality, but lack pace. At times there will copious space down the left that Baines could run into after the play has been on the right for a while, but the player in front of Baines naturally drifted more centrally to contribute, meaning Baines is not allowed to get forward as he has in previous seasons. We see this all around the pitch, with positional triggers constantly going off and on, if a guard is present to anticipate the opposition breaking, then the individual player can enter the offensive phase.
What this allows for is Davies to make penetrating runs throughout the first hour, and so long as the deep right midfield is covered, it allows Barkley to basically roam freely, and completely run the match. We saw this when we played at Palace away used him to great effect, that day he showed why he is our main creator.
In laymans terms, Koeman wants true expression from his players, but when and only when the defense is certain to form how he wants it at any given time, regardless of what players fill the positions. In West Brom it’s rare to see the back 4 have their roles filled by another should they be elsewhere on the pitch, it is still their responsibility, but with Koeman, discipline equates to freedom of expression.
For a team so structured to have so much fluidity is almost an oxymoron, but not quite, because this is real life and no formation/philosophy is perfect. The main issue with his approach to the set up, is when faced with penetrating speedy players like Zaha, Mane or Gray, we have seen our defense completely fold. I think with work and after developing more team chemistry, this problem will become less severe over time, and Koeman will find solutions.
Up the Ev.