With less than 24 hours to go before Everton face Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium, Sean Dyche has been speaking about forward Neal Maupay’s form and lack of goals.
The Frenchman has led the line for the Toffees’ in the last two home matches, the win over Leeds, and last Saturday’s defeat by Aston Villa.
He started the match playing on his own up front and struggled to make any impact on the game. Against Leeds it didn’t matter as right-back Seamus Coleman’s strike settled it and Everton claimed the points.
Last weekend though, the Blues’ missed several chances to score (including Maupay himself) before Villa grabbed two second half goals to leave with the win, despite being second best for most of the match.
Maupay’s lack of height, pace and movement and his inability to get behind a defence, make him really unsuited to operating as a lone front man, especially for a team whose attack is designed to provide service to a tall, physically imposing centre-forward.
He couldn’t make any impression last Saturday against the big men in Villa’s central defence despite their deficiencies.
That combined with the fact he is far from prolific as a goalscorer, means that it will be very hard to see how he can lead the line at the Emirates, let alone solve that chronic goal problem the Toffees’ face.
Everton manager Dyche though, still seems to be fully behind his struggling striker. And, following his comments today it looks very likely Mauapy will start again at Arsenal tomorrow.
This is a worrying sign, because it seems crystal clear from the last two matches, that on his own Maupay isn’t going to make an impression on the Gunners.
At the very least, I feel that if the former Brighton man is going to play tomorrow night, he must have some direct support whether that is Ellis Simms or Demarai Gray playing alongside him.
The other more left-field option might be to push a midfielder like Abdoulaye Doucoure further forward to provide a direct, physical presence up top.
I highly doubt Dyche will be that creative, at least not yet. The problem is though, I simply don’t see the Toffees’ scoring a goal tomorrow with Maupay ploughing a lonely furrow in attack.