Anecedotally, it's not too difficult for Everton supporters to consider the start of the last several seasons and realize that the Toffees have not appeared to kick off when the season does.
But then you run across a bit of data that takes the storytelling and confirms that, in fact, Everton have been absolutely horrendous in August and September going back nearly four seasons now, and it is even worse than most supporters might have thought.
Everton have played 21 matches in the months of August and September across the last four Premier League seasons and won three times.
— Aaron Barton (@Aaron__Barton) August 19, 2025
You’d think Everton, for once, would start a season and actually look ready to go in terms of squad depth, fitness, being ‘up’ for it… pic.twitter.com/gP9HX88AQa
Yes, you're reading the chart correctly. Going back to August of 2022, when Everton opened the season at Goodison Park against Chelsea under Frank Lampard, the Toffees have won exactly three Premier League matches in August and September.
Outside of those three (all of which were the final match in September for each season, mind you), Everton have lost 12 times, including Monday away to Leeds, and drawn six, and all but one of those
(a nil-nil derby at Goodison) were of the 1-1 variety.
A lot of this comes down to poor work on the part of the recruitment team to get players in the door sooner during the summer, much like they have this year, rendering new players useless for the first several weeks of the campaign.
To be fair, some of those summers saw Everton severely limited in what the club could spend, requiring more creativity on the market, something that can slow the process down. But the club should have also been aware of those shortcomings heading into the season, and needed better plans for how to attack the shrinking budgets.
But for a club that has found itself up against the relegation wall more often that not during that period, slow starts just cannot happen. Even if you believe they were hard done by a shoddy penalty on Monday, the best result that Everton could have hoped for at Elland Road was another 0-0 draw. Not exactly inspiring.
And with no further signings on the horizon, that means it'll be the same group available on Sunday for the opener at Hill Dickinson Stadium, save for maybe an injury return or two.
Whatever the case, the lesson should be clear: Everton need to figure out a way to get off to a running start to the season, because limping into the year isn't getting the job done.