Everton’s Europa League group campaign got off to the worst possible start as they were comfortably beaten 3-0 by Serie A side Atalanta in the Mapei Stadium on Thursday night.
Ronald Koeman’s men will know that they have a good chance of progressing and doing well in the competition, but they are going to have to perform much better than they did in Italy if they are to do that.
The Dutchman made six changes to his starting line-up and it showed as the Toffees looked disjointed, finding themselves 3-0 down at half-time with an almost impossible mountain to climb after the break.
The defeat was their third in a row in a row in all competitions following losses against Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur in the Premier League, and they have also failed to score while conceding eight times in those reverses.
Some of Koeman’s players clearly aren’t at the races right now and they will be fearing for their places in the team ahead of the trip to Manchester United on Sunday.
Here are three out-of-form Everton players that must be dropped after the Atalanta horror show…
Phil Jagielka
The experienced centre-back came back into the side in place of Ashley Williams following the 3-0 defeat to Tottenham Hotspur last weekend but he did little to show that he should keep his spot against Manchester United following a lacklustre performance in Italy.
The 35-year-old was partly at fault for Atalanta’s opener when Everton failed to deal with the corner he had given away after he was pulled out of position, and the ball ricocheted off of him before Andrea Masiello poked home.
Rusty and ponderous throughout, Koeman must drop Jagielka and recall Williams to play alongside Michael Keane at Old Trafford on Sunday.
Morgan Schneiderlin
This was probably the midfielder’s worst performance in an Everton shirt and he just hasn’t quite been at the races so far this season for whatever reason.
The 27-year-old was something of a passenger in the middle of the park and didn’t grab the game by the scruff of the neck like Toffees fans know that he can.
He was also partly responsible for two of the goals conceded as he lost Andrea Petagna at the corner for the first, before he gave the ball away in the lead-up to Atalanta’s third.
Schneiderlin was deservedly taken off after 66 minutes and Koeman should choose to keep him on the substitutes’ bench for the trip to the Frenchman’s former club on Sunday.
Gylfi Sigurdsson
Everton signed Sigurdsson in a club-record £45m deal last month, but he is yet to make the impact that the Merseyside outfit perhaps would have expected him to.
While he did have one decent shot against Atalanta, like Schneiderlin he didn’t take control of the game in an attacking sense.
The 27-year-old has the quality and the experience to do that but with no goals and assists in his last four appearances for the Toffees, perhaps it is time for him to be dropped to the substitutes’ bench until he rediscovers his form.
Do you agree, Everton fans? Let us know below.
