Everton may need a new number nine but Leeds need considerably more

Everton need a new number nine but they have a plan and some determination. Leeds United look very much as though they don’t even have a plan at the moment.

It was already tight at the bottom, it’s continuing to contract, and at Goodison Park, at the end of a match during which Everton and Leeds United really put their neuroses on display for the world to see, things are looking especially bad for Leeds. It wasn’t just that they lost, though they did. It wasn’t just that they lost while playing badly, though they did. It wasn’t just that teams clustered around them at the foot of the table all picked up to a lesser or greater extent unexpected points, though they did. It was that all of this happened, and there still seems to be no coherent plan at Elland Road on how to get out of a position that is starting to look a little bit like a tailspin, and with time starting to run out.

If we are to assume that Sean Dyche’s Everton are at the ‘traditional’ end of the scale, then considering the history of this club is does feel as though they really need a number nine. Everton are the club of  Dixie Dean, Joe Royle, Gary Lineker and Duncan Ferguson, and although such memories are becoming increasingly distant, it still feels wrong to see a team in these blue shirts that looks so toothless when attacking.

They found the one moment they needed against Arsenal, but in the Merseyside derby they seemed to revert to some of the bad habits of the late Lampard era, while seemingly forgetting how they’d achieved their previous win. When you’re labouring at the wrong end of the table, confidence can be brittle. But they regained their shape against Leeds, a performance which suggested that perhaps the Liverpool performance had been the aberration rather than the Arsenal one. They are deficient. That much is confirmed by the evidence of all of our own eyes. But they have fight, and they have something approaching a plan.

Neither can be said for Leeds. Whether it was or wasn’t the right decision to sack Jesse Marsch, the apparent failure of the club to have much of a succession plan remains something of a surprise. Away to Manchester United, their Not That Manager Any More bounce had propelled them to a 2-2 draw and they might even have regretted slightly not winning, having led 2-0 for a spell. But at home in the return they seemed to withdraw back into their shell somewhat, and their performance against Everton was as weak as anything…