Wolves 3-1 Everton: Typical

At some point during the second half of today’s match, a black cat wandered onto the field. The kitty wouldn’t leave, and nobody other than Cenk Tosun - not even a steward - was willing to shoo it off the field. As humorous as the moment was, it was in other ways a picture of the state of things around the club. Something was in the way of Everton progressing with their football, and nobody cared enough to do a damn thing about it.

Wolverhampton Wanderers came to Goodison Park, and Everton could not have been more hospitable if they’d rolled out the red carpet. The Blues gifted Wolves goals via all manner of ways - penalties, hospital passes and set piece defending.

In attack, Everton didn’t really do...well, anything. There was a moment of individual brilliance from Andre Gomes - and trust me, it was brilliant - but other than that, Marco Silva was out of ideas entirely.

If you think that “Marco Silva being entirely out of ideas” is a recurring theme, you would be correct. Today we saw a clearly injured Leighton Baines start, which resulted in having to burn an early sub, which then meant that Everton were out of defenders on the bench. Eventually, Jonjoe Kenny ended up at center back. It was one of those days.

It is likely that Everton’s chase for 7th place is over. Not mathematically, of course, but you’d be extremely hard pressed to see a way this current collection of footballers finds it within themselves to make a run up the table. The Blues have now lost three of their last four games, with the only win coming against a soon relegated Huddersfield Town.

The question now becomes where the club goes from here. Marco Silva’s troubleshooting ability seems limited to nonexistent, the players have zero resiliency or belief, and the transfer window is over. What was once a club defined by its heart and battle is now a limp shell of itself. It’s going to be a long spring.