Manchester United games against Everton have acquired an added significance through the events of last season. This time last year the joke doing the rounds was that David Moyes had finally seen Everton win at Old Trafford.
He never managed it in 11 years of trying on Merseyside, but when Roberto Martínez got the chance he posted a victory at the first time of asking. Only later in the season, by which time half a dozen other sides had done the same, did it become clear that the currency of taking three points from Old Trafford had become somewhat devalued.
A new manager is in charge now, and for Louis van Gaal Sunday’s game ought to bring the first real test of the season. Everton finished higher than United in the league in 2013-14, and so kind has the fixture list been to the new regime in Manchester that this is Van Gaal’s first meeting with top-six opponents. While that makes quite a contrast to the start United had to make last season, when Moyes actually complained about the difficulty of the opening few games, Van Gaal’s side have fallen into the habit of making life difficult for themselves. In the last two league games alone they have been comprehensively dismantled by newly promoted Leicester and forced to hang on with 10 men at home to West Ham.
Everton have not made a sparkling start to the season either, and it was slightly disconcerting to hear both managers before the game speaking of the need to be recognised as a big club. In Van Gaal’s case, he was talking about the need for stellar acquisitions to work as a team and defend better. “When you want to be a big team you have to perform like one,” the United manager said. “It’s not just about scoring goals, we get enough of those, it is about dominating the game. To do that you need better defensive organisation, and that is about teamwork. You cannot just blame the defence because proper, organised defending begins with the strikers.
“We have brought in a certain type of player, a lot of creative, attacking talents. Those players not only have to look to making a goal but also consider the rest of the defensive shape and measure the risk of every pass they give. It is a process, it will take time, but we are improving, even if we are still losing the ball too easily.”
For Martínez, speaking just a few hours after a five-hour flight back from Russia and confirming that Everton plan to give free tickets for the next Europa League away game to the 500 fans who made the arduous trip to Krasnodar, the sign of a big team is the ability to take such inconveniences in their stride. “Of course we are a bit disappointed that the kick-off against United is at noon,” he said. “Every hour of recovery helps, but we are not going to moan about it. We accept the challenge of playing in Europe, we embrace the difficulties it throws up, because it is what we want to be doing. It is part of what you must expect if you want to be a big club.”
Another aspect of Martínez’s philosophy, introduced to an appreciative audience last season after 11 years of Moyes’s sometimes overcautious approach, is the self-belief necessary to go for a win against any opposition. “I hope there is more expectancy on us now – that has always been the aim,” the Everton manager said. “We don’t want to be going to places looking at damage limitation or merely hoping for a result. We want to have a plan to win the game. It doesn’t always work, but our fans are very realistic about what can be expected from us. When we lost 6-3 against Chelsea we were still clapped off, because the supporters could see we gave everything from the first whistle.”
Martínez maintains Old Trafford is still one of the toughest places to go – “You know you need to be at your best to achieve a positive result” – although the truth is no one really knows what to expect from United any more. Van Gaal knows that Everton beat them home and away last season, yet is possibly unaware of the damage the first of those defeats inflicted on his predecessor. Just about the last thing Moyes needed, when he was already struggling to live up to the confidence Sir Alex Ferguson had placed in him, was for his old club to turn up with a brighter manager with a knack of almost instantly achieving results.
Van Gaal’s situation is not quite so precarious, though just as with Moyes there will be limited patience if Champions League football cannot be attained, especially after all the money that has been spent.
“I believe I will get the time I need,” Van Gaal said. “Yes, we want to be in the Champions League but it might not be at once. There is a trajectory and a process of three years. I didn’t have to come here. I was asked, and I have signed a contract for three years. Believe me, I shall finish that.”
