Everton are Doomed

Everton are doomed and the worst part about it is, is that it’s not even a surprise at this point. One of the Premier League’s ever-presents are again one of the favourites for relegation this season.

Younger football fans may not be aware, but Everton were one of the most successful English sides in the 1980s. While they’ve never hit those heights since, Everton’s drop-off in recent seasons has been extremely dramatic and relegation would only be the start of their problems, if it happens.

So, we’re going to take a look at Everton’s current predicament and what the future could be like for the blue half of Merseyside.

Everton are Doomed

A quick look at the Premier League table will tell you Everton are currently in the relegation zone, but that’s only scratching at the surfaces of the Toffees’ issues. You don’t bring Sean Dyche in as manager to play entertaining football, but even by Dyche’s standards, this season has been dire to watch as an Everton fan.

Everton have scored the lowest number of goals, created the lowest number of chances and missed the most “big chances” of any side in the Premier League. That means that not only are they ineffective in attack, but even when they do get through on goal, they usually fail to score. That’s a very bad combination.

Everton are currently the only side giving the promoted sides of Burnley, Sheffield United and Luton Town hope of staying in the division. In fact, their only point of the season so far came against Sheffield and even that was only thanks to a miracle double-save in the last minute by Jordan Pickford.

Everton Football Club have been in the English top flight for over 70 years, a streak only bettered by their opponents this weekend, Arsenal. If the Blues are to keep that record going though, they’ll need to step it up soon.

New owners, same problems

So, things aren’t going to plan on the pitch, but what about off it? Well, things have definitely changed, as the 777 Partners completed their takeover of the Goodison Park club last week. Some sections of Everton’s support will have been celebrating this, but perhaps they should be careful what they wish for.

The 777 Partners are an American investment company that already have a lot of sports clubs in their portfolio. Focusing on the football side, that includes Hertha Berlin, Sevilla and Standard Liege.

You may rightfully point out that all of those clubs are big in their respective countries, but there is serious cause for concern for Evertonians. Hertha Berlin were relegated from the Bundesliga last season and are currently only just above the relegation zone in the 2. Bundesliga.

Sevilla may have won the Europa League last season, but only got their first win of their La Liga campaign this weekend against relegation rivals Las Palmas. Standard Liege are only above the relegation zone on goal difference after finishing in mid-table last season.

Do you see a pattern emerging here?

Say what you want about Farhad Moshiri, but Everton’s former owner did invest a lot of money into the club during his tenureship. Over the past five seasons, Everton’s net spend is only bettered by the Manchester clubs and Chelsea.

Given the amount of money they’ve spent, they should be at a minimum challenging for the Champions League. Instead, they’re looking destined for the Championship. That level of spending isn’t sustainable, and 777 may decide that those days are over at Goodison.

What relegation would mean

Relegation would be nothing short of a disaster for Everton. In 2022-23 Everton’s wage bill was twelfth overall in the Premier League. While that has gone down a lot in recent seasons, there is a very large and shiny elephant in the room when it comes to Everton’s finances.

The Everton Stadium is due to open in time for the 2024-25 season and could launch Everton into the 21st century. As iconic as Goodison Park is, it’s not suited to top-level football anymore, as Everton lag behind in terms of corporate and hospitality facilities.

While the Everton Stadium will be a huge stream of revenue for Everton, it could also be a huge drain on their finances if they go down. At a cost of £500 million, it is an expensive ground and one they’d need to fill every weekend in order to repay the debt accrued in constructing it.

Everton are a big club, but even they would struggle to sell out a 55,000 capacity stadium in the second tier. Coupled with the fact that most of their best players would leave if they were relegated and we could be talking about a club in serious financial trouble.

“Survival” has taken on a whole new meaning for Everton this season and the question now is how long will 777 wait until pulling the trigger on Dyche? And who, if anybody, could save them?