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Is James injury problem a threat to Everton season

By Matt Townsend

Everton's Colombian midfielder James Rodriguez controls the ball during the English Premier League football match between Burnley and Everton at Turf Moor in Burnley, north west England on December 5, 2020. (Photo by Oli SCARFF / POOL / AFP) / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE. No use with unauthorized audio, video, data, fixture lists, club/league logos or 'live' services. Online in-match use limited to 120 images. An additional 40 images may be used in extra time. No video emulation. Social media in-match use limited to 120 images. An additional 40 images may be used in extra time. No use in betting publications, games or single club/league/player publications. / (Photo by OLI SCARFF/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Everton's Colombian midfielder James Rodriguez controls the ball during the English Premier League football match between Burnley and Everton at Turf Moor in Burnley, north west England on December 5, 2020. (Photo by Oli SCARFF / POOL / AFP) / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE. No use with unauthorized audio, video, data, fixture lists, club/league logos or 'live' services. Online in-match use limited to 120 images. An additional 40 images may be used in extra time. No video emulation. Social media in-match use limited to 120 images. An additional 40 images may be used in extra time. No use in betting publications, games or single club/league/player publications. / (Photo by OLI SCARFF/POOL/AFP via Getty Images) /
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Carlo Ancelotti has revealed that James Rodriguez will be missing for the last two Premier League games of 2020. Is the Colombian’s mounting injury problems a threat to what Everton can achieve this season?

The Everton manager has confirmed what most of us probably suspected anyway, that Rodriguez will be missing until the end of the calendar month and won’t play in the match tonight at Sheffield United as well as the game against Manchester City next week.

So yet again the Toffees will be without their star forward as they try and maintain the excellent form they have shown in the past three Premier League matches.

In one sense it’s not a massive problem because the Blues have learnt to win without him recently, collecting all nine points from those games.

However, obviously as we’ve said many times before no one in the Everton squad possesses the same level of technical skill and creative ability as the Colombian. Without him the lack of flair was particularly evident in the win over Arsenal when the Toffees looked tired and lacked attacking invention.

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The continuing absences of the Colombian superstar is becoming a worrying trend during this campaign.

It’s what I feared might happen when I wrote about his injuries at the time he was close to joining. I said then that the Blues were taking a considerable risk signing him given that record.

It’s a long and convoluted one and he has spent many weeks and months over the past few years unable to play for his various clubs.

This record is even more of a problem because he has already become such a key element in the Toffee’s attack, creating dozens of chances and assisting and scoring three goals despite his injuries.

This latest issue with his fitness comes after he struggled for weeks to shake off a knock he received back in October’s Merseyside derby, which has inhibited him ever since.

The other concerning aspect of this is the habit Ancelotti has of downplaying his problems only to then have to backtrack and admit the player will be missing for much longer than he had originally said would be the case.

Previously Ancelotti had said Rodriguez only had a slight problem but now it seems that he is struggling with a much more serious injury. We do need accurate and consistent information from the manager.

Although Everton have done very well without him this past few weeks, it’s tough to keep finding that level of energy and effort with such a packed fixture list at this time of year. And constantly losing Rodriguez like this will be a major blow to morale as well.

The Blues will of course need his quality on the pitch at some point soon and over the course of the rest of the season. If he spends much more time out it could significantly damage the Toffees chances of achieving something in this campaign.

In more injury-related news, Richarlison will not play tonight at Sheffield United. Although his head injury might not be too serious and he was saying so on social media, the new rules on such knocks will force him to sit out for a week meaning if so he will also miss the upcoming match against City as well.

Without the two South Americans again the Blues’ attack will be seriously impaired and that makes securing another couple of wins significantly more challenging.

Every Evertonian knows the fact that since he joined the club, the Toffees have never won a Premier League game without the Brazilian forward in the team. Based on this history, the chances are that the Blues good record of late will be coming to an end.

The transfer window is just around the corner and there are several positions that ideally Everton could and perhaps should try and strengthen if they can.

Those would I think be getting in a centre-forward to cover for and support Dominic Calvert-Lewin and also adding some central midfield reinforcements, again to cover for injuries and give Ancelotti better quality options.

Perhaps given all these endless injuries another area to consider now will be the wide forward positions. That makes for quite a January shopping list.