David Unsworth was able to oversee an improved performance in the League Cup against Chelsea, albeit in defeat, but the caretaker wasn’t able to improve Everton fortunes at Leicester on Sunday.
Two first half goals allowed Leicester to run out 2-0 winners at the King Power Stadium, under a new boss of their own, as former Southampton boss Claude Puel, who replaced Craig Shakespeare, took charge of his first game.
Jamie Vardy finished a counter-attack to put Leicester ahead early in the first half before Demarai Gray, who has been credited with the goal, saw his cross sliced into his own net by Jonjoe Kenny – the Blues defender wouldn’t want it to go down as an own goal – ahead of the half hour mark.
A Christian Fuchs foul on Aaron Lennon should have seen Everton awarded a penalty shortly after the Foxes’ second goal, which wasn’t given, but once again, despite the Blues’ second half dominance, failure to create enough clear cut chances and a lack of goals proved costly.
Ultimately though, in spite of the improvement in the second half, it was the opening 45 minutes’ failings, as Unsworth knows; which hurt us the most on Sunday.
The caretaker was quoted post-match by the BBC: ‘Second half we were much, much better. But we gave them a two-goal start because we didn’t perform in the first half.’
Defeat means we remain in the bottom three, now without a win in seven games in all competitions, having scored just seven goals this season, which is better only than Bournemouth and Crystal Palace – the two sides directly below the Blues. Only Palace have conceded more.
However, Unsworth is still interested in getting the job on a permanent basis but stressed the importance of whoever does become the Blues’ next boss being given time to implement their own ‘set of ideas’ on the players.
Unsworth added: ‘Whoever gets the honour of being Everton manager, myself included, needs time with this set of players because you all have your own set of ideas. Every coach and manager has their idea of how they want to play, I certainly do, and you need time on the training ground to implement those ideas.’
It is now an unlucky 13 without an away win for the Toffees.
