While the preparation and energy Everton fans put into protesting against perceived Premier League corruption over the weekend was commendable, some folk are finding it difficult to understand what it is exactly they are so unhappy about. Everton are founder members of the Premier League. Everton broke Premier League rules. Everton admitted breaking Premier League rules. Everton were punished for breaking Premier League rules. So while Everton and their fans have every right to feel aggrieved by what they see as an excessively punitive sanction, it seems a bit odd that they have decided the body that handed it down is “corrupt”. If anything, it could be argued that the decision to slap one of their most established members with a 10-point deduction is evidence that the Premier League is demonstrably even-handed and fair. For now, Football Daily is reserving judgment until we see what happens if Manchester City are found guilty of any or all of the 115 charges of rule-breaking currently levelled at them.
Older, more jaded readers will remember that City claim to be in possession of incontrovertible evidence that proves their innocence but for reasons best known to themselves and their lawyers, seem weirdly reluctant to make it public. On Saturday and Sunday, Sky Sports demonstrated similar reticence, going out of their way to avoid broadcasting any images of Everton fan protest banners over the Etihad or in the stands at Goodison Park. They even went so far as to reduce and at times replace the angry crowd noises at Goodison Park, to spare TV viewers the trauma of hearing unhappy fans shouting rude words. Fan fury, it seems, is all well and good, unless it risks damaging the carefully buffed Premier League brand.
Few Premier League crowds do seething fury quite like Everton’s and with everyone apparently out to get them, it was expected their festering sense of resentment would filter down on to the players representing them on the pitch. With an in-form but out-of-sorts Manchester United in town, many had predicted an Everton win. What precisely nobody had predicted was a potential goal of the season contender from Alejandro Garnacho, whose astonishing acrobatic overhead howitzer within three minutes of kick-off prompted scenes of outright delirium on the pitch and in the away end, as well as predictably tedious comparisons with similar efforts scored by other players, from the kind of buzzkills who apparently can’t appreciate one nice thing unless it is evidently better than every other nice thing that has gone before. “I can’t believe it, to be honest,” said Garnacho. “I didn’t see how I scored, I just turned around and I said ‘Oh my god’. But yeah, for me, one of the best goals I’ve scored of course and I’m very happy.”
Despite this early setback, Everton rallied and should have equalised or even been ahead by the time Ashley Young put the game beyond his own team by wafting a lazy leg in front of Anthony Martial inside his own penalty area and bringing the Frenchman down. “The way the game’s going, that’s bizarre to me,” growled Sean Dyche, in his lengthy post-match moan about the perfectly legitimate penalty awarded for a blatant foul by a player on his team. When club managers are happy to air such misguided and illegitimate grievances, is it any wonder fans are prepared to do the same?
Fuming Evertonians, earlier. Photograph: Michael Regan/Getty Images
