Newcastle vs. Everton Preview

Everton’s difficult run of fixtures continues on Saturday with a trip to St. James’ Park to face Alan Pardew’s unbeaten Newcastle United.

Newcastle have been sat in the Champions League places a little too long for the pundits’ liking, so there’s been a lot of talk lately about how the wheels will inevitably fall off and their season will amount to nothing. While they’ll almost certainly finish outside the top four, Newcastle have drawn with Arsenal and Tottenham and picked up an impressive away win at Stoke so far in their opening ten Premier League games, so they’re not a team to be taken lightly.

Still, regardless of Newcastle’s form Everton need to start getting points on the board after what’s been an incredibly challenging a run of games. A deserved win at Fulham (I know Bobby Zamora’s miss was ridiculous, but Everton murdered them in the first half) was followed by a home defeat to Manchester United that made it four losses out of five in the league for David Moyes and leaves Everton languishing in 16th.

The performance against United was decent enough in terms of keeping possession and limiting the champions’ chances, but, as is almost always the case, Everton never really looked like scoring.

Louis Saha drops far too deep to be effective as a lone striker, and even when he does play on the shoulder the midfield’s pacifist approach to killer passes does him no favours. If his brilliant goals against Fulham and Chelsea were a reminder of his talent, his efforts against United showed why bringing in a new striker still has to be Moyes’ number one priority.

Another problem is that none of the midfielders look to get beyond Saha when he drops into ‘the hole’ or pulls out wide. I don’t know if it’s because they’re told to hold their positions, lack the energy to get back if the move breaks down, or just can’t be arsed making a run for him when they know he’ll probably try some mad shot anyway. Whatever the reason, Everton need to change things up in attack.

If Tim Cahill is passed fit then he’ll probably play, but I’d sooner see Apostolos Vellios given the job of leading the line and opening up space for Saha and the wide players to attack. Vellios wasn’t great when he started at Fulham but he’s shown he can score and deserves a run in the team, especially since we’ve seen time and time again that Cahill and Saha don’t complement each other at all.

Sylvain Distin will likely come straight back in at centre-half at the expense of John Heitinga if he’s over the injury that kept him out last week. Heitinga’s presence in defence reduces the number of times possession is needlessly conceded by aimlessly punting the ball forward, but he dived in for the penalty against Chelsea in the League Cup and lost Hernandez for United’s goal last week, so he’ll almost certainly be the one to make way. If Distin doesn’t make it then it could be a long afternoon for Heitinga and Phil Jagielka, because one-time Everton target Demba Ba is looking unstoppable for Newcastle at the moment.

Marouane Fellaini’s suspension is a blow, but the return of Royston Drenthe after his own one game ban will hopefully compensate. The Dutchman has his faults, but there’s no denying that his raw pace and willingness to take risks adds an extra dimension to what can often be a painfully predictable Everton attack.

One reason I’m feeling fairly optimistic about Everton’s chances of getting a result is the vastly improved form of Jack Rodwell. The England U-21 international, who is apparently on the verge of a call up to the full squad, has quietly carved out a niche for himself as the anchor in Everton’s midfield and put in a string of stellar performances since receiving plaudits for his man-marking job on David Silva a few weeks ago.

Rodwell will need to have another big game if Everton are to pick up three points at St. James’ for the second successive season, because Yohan Cabaye is capable of dictating games from midfield when teams give him space to play. Controlling the centre of the park will be made easier if the excellent Cheik Tiote fails to recover from a knee injury, but either way Cabaye will need to be watched.

Despite Newcastle’s superb start to the season it’s still hard not to fancy even the most toothless strikeforce against a defence led by Fabricio Coloccini and Steven Taylor. Coloccini loves to dive in like an idiot and Taylor is a clumsy oaf, but exposing them will require getting players into their penalty area, and that’s something Everton struggle to do even at Goodison.

I’d like to see Moyes resist the temptation to replace Fellaini with Phil Neville and instead move Leon Osman inside to partner Rodwell. I can’t see it though.

Probable team: (4-5-1) Howard; Hibbert, Jagielka, Distin, Baines; Coleman, Rodwell, Neville, Drenthe, Osman; Saha