FA Cup Heartbreak

There’s nothing like a bit of FA Cup heartbreak to get you writing again!

Well where do I even start?

What an explosive game. It had everything a proper cup tie needs, a red card, scuffles between your own players (LOL West Ham), a penalty shoot out, spectacular saves, a beauty of a free kick, a perfect tribute and so much more.

Despite the fact I’m gutted and it feels more like we lost the FA Cup final, not the third round, I feel more inspired that this injury stricken Everton team are starting to turn it around. The passion and fight they showed last night was tremendous.

It only seems right I start with Joel Robles and his amazing performance. When I learned that Tim Howard was injured, I wanted to cry, we had a shaky sub goalie in Robles with not a lot of match experience for us. But I hold my hands up, he has improved with every game he has played and last night his one handed saves kept us in the game.

He was calm and organised throughout the game and we didn’t see the usual flappy performance he sometimes displays. It was such a cruel, cruel way for him to end the night. A ‘hammer-blow’ as the BT pundits kept calling it, (don’t get me started on them!) for Robles to be our man of the match to then be the man to end our cup run. I must admit I didn’t have much hope that his spot kick was going to go in and then for him to have to stand in goal and face that Adrian, I just knew that was it. We wouldn’t have even made it past the 90 minutes without Robles so his head should be held very high.

As biased as this may sound, I really believe we were the better side and deserved to win that tie. I’d like to move on to the referee, thoughts?

McGeady’s sending off was fair and didn’t really do us much harm apart from it leaving the final spot kick to Robles, but how many of us think McGeady would have scored it anyway?! One of my contacts has suggested that the FA should review his sending off, in the hope he might get a three match ban, rather than just one. (He’s not a fan of McGeady’s.)

At least the sending off urged Martinez to bring Mirallas on, something he should have done anyway, though I appreciate he isn’t quite match fit. The ref for me scores about 5/10. He – as Bobby said post match – wasn’t consistent enough.

“My only complaint is you want a bit of consistency with the physicality West Ham were playing with, the yellow cards weren’t shared out in the same manner.”

How was Andy Carroll not booked for persistent fouling? Nolan was booked for them and that was it, they were nasty, time wasters, shirt pullers, elbowers, fouling, sneaky players and deserved to have been in the ref’s book more than we were. The final straw was when he had a word with Robles while holding a yellow card, did he not see this?!

Picture from Daily Mail.

Adrian was awful! Practically screaming at Naisy!

Moving on, Phil Jagielka was everything we needed him to be last night. A stalwart in defence, strong and defiant. He has also been shaky of late but showed no hint of a wobble last night. The same can’t be said for John Stones, but he is young and still has much to learn and is already so much better than he’s been.

Lukaku would have undoubtedly had a lot on his mind following the sudden and tragic death of Junior Malanda, but like a true professional he powered on. He got his goal and fittingly made an emotional tribute to Malanda which nearly had me in tears.

Lukaku was proving his worth, he was all over the pitch, hungry for the ball, playing some really fancy football and then that goal! Bravo!

I couldn’t believe it when we went up 2-1, I thought that was it, we’ve got this. The roar of the travelling 3,000 fans was heart-warming! The skill Mirallas showed in the run-up to that goal was breath-taking, world class skill! To run and weave in and out of about 4 West Ham players showed the truly amazing player he is.

But alas, the football God’s wanted a penalty shoot out and my word they got one. I was beside myself, literally could not cope, I was pacing around the room, sat on the floor, clutching a cushion to my face, jumping for joy, yelling at the television and then finally sat with my head in my hands.

I wonder if you can work out which parts of the match my sister and I are talking about here…

So it wasn’t to be this time and despite thinking we’d hit ‘the turning point’ already this season, I finally think last night may just be it…

I’ll leave you with my favourite part of the match.

Until next time Blues…

 

 

Yay or Nay-Smith?

Up until yesterday I can’t say I was a massive fan of Steven Naismith.

Photo courtesy of ‘team talk.com’

After his performance in yesterday’s FA Cup match however, my opinion has completely changed!

His goal was (excuse the cliché) cool, calm and collected! Many strikers would have sent that shot wide, but not our Naisy! As well as him winning the penalty which sealed the deal!

He has had so much stick from Rangers’ fans and a few Evertonians, but he was well within his rights to do what he did. He’s proved his worth, scoring 4 goals in the last 6 games and he makes a big difference these days when he comes on!

But bless him when he was knocked near unconscious yesterday, he ploughed on, until – and rightly so – he decided, yeah guys, that’s it!! The fact he didn’t remember his goal is a shame, but that he didn’t remember the game, ain’t such a bad thing!

I don’t really know where my previous poor opinion of him came from, I guess I was swayed by the boo’s around me! He was sloppy when he first started and I just felt he was out of his league, but he is really coming into his own and is proving to be a pretty great asset to Everton FC!

My usual groan when I see him on the team sheet, has now turned into a silent glimmer of hope for his goal scoring abilities, something we are seriously lacking at the mo!!

Thoughts guys? Yay or Nay-Smith?

If you’re undecided, take a look at the highlights below to see Naisy’s goal!!

Photo courtesy of ‘The Guardian’