Spurs v Everton: can Blues win their final game
The 2018-19 Premier League season finishes on Sunday and Everton renew their London travel passes for the umpteenth time as they return to the capital to play Tottenham Hotspur.
This match is a difficult one to call in some ways. Spurs have of course reached the Champions League final this week in brilliant style and that might give Everton a chance to finish the season with a win.
It’s possible that the north London club will come down from that high and so they could follow-up that amazing Wednesday night with a much flatter performance at the weekend.
Obviously it might not work that way of course. Wednesday’s win might instead inspire them to finish well at their new home, so it might turn out to be a tough afternoon for the Toffees.
It would be great to think that maybe the Blues will be able to enjoy a night like that in the not too distant future.
Everton have an additional incentive to try to turn Spurs over on Sunday after enduring their worst afternoon this season when Tottenham thrashed the Blues 6-2 at Goodison Park back in December.
Overall despite performances like that Tottenham’s season was, until Wednesday night anyway, looking like it might peter out again as the past few campaigns have.
They had missed out again on the league title and both domestic cups and their season seemed to be imploding as recently as last weekend as they lost at Bournemouth.
Spurs have a very fine team but it feels like if they don’t win the Champions League, (or even if they do), it could break up this summer.
As for the Toffees, recent weeks have restored some faith amongst Evertonians that despite a difficult and at times wildly inconsistent season, there are real signs of progress to build on.
Finally restored defensive resilience and a steadily more potent attack have produced some outstanding performances at home against a succession of top six teams.
Importantly Everton have also managed to maintain that level of excellence, apart from that irritating stumble at Fulham.
That defeat underlined the extent of work that still needs to be done as the Blues are not able to replicate that home form away. Improving that record will be crucial to sustaining and building on this late-season momentum.
Marco Silva has said that both Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Richarlison will miss the game with Seamus Coleman also a doubt. This news is quite a blow.
Both Calvert-Lewin and Richarlison have been key parts of the recent run of impressive wins and will be missed.
Of the two I think that the young English centre forward will be the harder to replace. He has been excellent acting as the focal point for the Blues attacking play and at least for now has solved the seemingly perennial problem of who should lead the line.
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With Richarlison out, if Coleman also fails any late fitness test Everton will have an entirely new partnership on the right hand side of the team. That could turn out to be the side’s Achilles heal.
My guess is that Jonjo Kenny and probably Ademola Lookman will take their places on Sunday, although maybe Theo Walcott will play?
Well we shall see. A good away performance and even three points would be a great statement to end the season.
At any rate let’s hope the Toffees can finally finish on a high after another rollercoaster of a season and then look forward to the summer to try and build again for another crack at the Premier League in August.