Everton 1, Arsenal 6

For the second summer running, hope and optimism have given way to despair and concern at Goodison Park.

Everton suffered their biggest home defeat since 1958 as David Moyes’ side were hammered 6-1 by an Arsenal team which, on paper at least, looked quite weak compared to some of the all-star line-ups Arsene Wenger has turned up with at Goodison in years gone by.

It wasn’t even a case of Arsenal delivering a vintage ‘Wenger performance’, with Everton being blown away with a magnificent display of ‘total football’. Arsenal were simply organised at the back, patient in possession, and neat and tidy with their passing – which was more than enough to give Everton the biggest hiding seen at Goodison Park in over 50 years.

In the opening stages it was a bit of a nothing game, with neither side really dominating due to the scrappy, stop-start nature of the contest. Then, after 26 minutes, Nicklas Bendtner (a player widely considered to be not good enough for Arsenal) was made to look like Cristiano Ronaldo as he brought a diagonal pass down on his chest (unchallenged) and proceeded to make a fool out of Leighton Baines by leaving him for dead with the slowest body-swerve since Andy van der Meyde’s comedy attempt at jinking past Alvaro Arbeloa during his now legendary cameo in last season’s ‘Gosling derby’.

With Baines left on his arse Bendtner passed the ball to Cesc Fabregas who, after cleverly drawing in two Everton defenders, teed it up for Denilson to dispatch a lovely curled shot into the top corner of Tim Howard’s goal. At which point the Everton players decided they’d had enough.

Maybe the lame surrender that followed Denilson’s strike was a result of all the hard work it took to drag a heavily depleted squad over the finish line and into an FA Cup final going completely unrewarded by a board of directors who remain incapable of raising transfer funds and unwilling to put the club up for sale. Or perhaps it’s down to Joleon Lescott teasing his soon to be former-team mates by parading around Finch Farm doing Floyd Mayweather impressions. Whatever the reason, it isn’t good enough.

Everton’s response amounted to a Maraoune Fellaini header being cleared off the line from a corner before Arsenal killed the game by taking advantage of ridiculously poor Everton defending from free-kicks.

In the first instance, Joseph Yobo didn’t even bother jumping as Arsenal debutant Thomas Vermaelen headed over Tim Howard at the back post to make it 2-0. This was followed by Joleon Lescott and Marouane Fellaini making token gestures of disappointment after the pair stood by and allowed William Gallas a free run on goal to make it three for the Gunners - effectively ending the game as a contest before half-time.

The second-half was proof, if any was needed, that (Steven Pienaar aside) when playing without the sort of spirit and cohesion that has been a staple of Everton’s relative success over recent seasons, David Moyes’ side are shown up as a set of fairly average individuals in comparison with the likes of Arsenal. The most glaring example of this was Arsenal’s fourth goal, when Andrey Arshavin dispossessed Tony Hibbert before casually knocking the ball through the hapless right-back’s legs and turning defence into attack with a single pass. Within a couple of seconds Cesc Fabregas had swept the ball through Tim Howard’s legs.

Everton players and fans alike had given up before half-time anyway, so it was no surprise when the crowd began to filter out after Fabregas’ goal, as despite there being over half an hour to play it was clear that Everton had nothing to offer Arsenal. This was confirmed on 68 minutes when Cesc Fabregas ran the length of the pitch unchallenged (unless you count Marouane Fellaini’s amusing efforts at sprinting back) before smashing a low drive inside Tim Howard’s right post to make it 5-0. Embarrassing.

Those who remained after Fabregas’ second probably did so under the assumption that at least things couldn’t get much worse, though unfortunately these optimistic souls hadn’t counted on Arsene Wenger sending on Croatian International striker Eduardo – who stabbed home the rebound after the excellent Arshavin had struck the post.

David Moyes was spared the humiliation of guiding Everton to their biggest ever home defeat when substitute Louis Saha kept a cool head to put away what couldn’t even be considered a consolation goal in added time.

Whether or not this awful performance sparks a flurry of transfer activity remains to be seen, but with David Moyes once again confirming that there is very little money to spend it seems highly unlikely that we’ll see anybody coming in that will offer any sort of significant improvement on what we already have. Which isn’t saying much considering both Leon Osman and Tony Hibbert start every week.

Next up for the Blues is a Europa League qualification tie against SK Sigma Olomouc of the Czech Republic. A convincing victory is a must, as another early exit from Europe really doesn’t bear thinking about.