What Everton fans can be thankful for

It’s Thanksgiving Day in the United States today, and one of the traditions on this national holiday is to give thanks for what we have.

For Everton fans in America, on Merseyside and everywhere else around the world, this is a good opportunity for us all to be grateful for where the Blues are today. Here are some things to be thankful for, in no particular order.

No More Big Sam

This time last year things were not going well for Everton. The Blues had sacked Ronald Koeman, David Unsworth was in charge and it was not clear how long that would last. The Toffees were struggling on the pitch and little did we know that a calamity known as Sam Allardyce was soon going to take over.

For the sake of brevity and our collective sanity, let’s not bother going through the excruciating details of his tenure and how awful the Blues were to watch last season. Suffice to say that we are all very, very relieved that Big Sam is gone.

The New Stadium

We love the Grand Old Lady, but Blues are very excited about our new home at the Bramley Moore docks. Progress has been slower than fans would like to see, and the snippets of the design elements that have come out have only whetted the supporters’ appetites.

The latest round of fan consultations are going on, and there is still controversy brewing over the stadium capacity, but this is also a good opportunity for us to be grateful about a fantastic new stadium that will be coming soon.

Everton’s Leadership

Farhad Moshiri has continued to increase his shareholding in Everton, making the move to become the majority owner this year. Under his stewardship, we’ve seen a complete overhaul at the Board level, the club’s headquarters have moved to swanky offices in the Royal Liver Building on the waterfront, a detailed plan is in place for the move to the docks and so more.

There was an announcement this week that season ticket prices will be frozen for the fourth straight year, an unprecedented move. While they aren’t the only club to freeze season ticket prices - 11 of the 20 sides froze their prices going into this season - but this is just a small part of a wider social initiative aimed at the local community. Just a quick glance at the Everton in the Community website will show some of the stellar work the club is doing across the region.

When we look around at other clubs in England, we can only be grateful that we have an owner whose ideals are no different from what we believe in, and continues to maintain Everton as the true People’s Club.

The M&M Show

While it was certainly an excellent move getting rid of Allardyce and Steve Walsh, Moshiri followed it up with an even better masterstroke - appointing Marcel Brands and Marco Silva.

Brands certainly has shown his mettle as Director of Football, especially in the summer transfer window. He has worked with Silva to get exactly the players that the manager needed, and so far it appears every one of them has worked out well. Richarlison, Lucas Digne, Yerry Mina, Bernard, Kurt Zouma and Andre Gomes have all settled in and played key roles already.

Fans can only be even more excited what the pair can do in the next couple of transfer windows, and it certainly appears the sky is the limit for where Brands and Silva can take us. Plus, it’s certainly nice to have one manager on Merseyside that’s won at least one trophy in his time here at Liverpool.

PS - By special request, one of the things at Goodison Park that supporters are very grateful for is that Chang is not the only beer available on draft at the stadium. While we miss the logo on the shirts, we certainly are relieved that we’ve moved on from that.