Please heed the warnings, Mr Dyche – No Young and fill the midfield

I will say right now this is not meant to be a personal attack on Ashley Young. It is just wanting what is best for Everton Football Club.

 

With that said, I cannot stress the importance of keeping Ashley Young out of the team, especially at full-back, where he is a complete and utter liability. How lucky we were to get away with 3 penalty shouts against Nottingham Forest so Sean Dyche should not push our luck any further.

 

Liverpool are not Nottingham Forest and, if Young is at full-back, there is a good treble the bookies might be refusing a bet on. Penalty, sending off and a cricket score (the cricket score could happen anyway if Dyche is not on it on Wednesday).

 

Young showed in the Anfield derby that it is just folly to take a chance with him and I think it would be madness to play him. Sub only and bring him on only in an emergency. The reality of Young is he is too old, he is just that little bit slow to react, to move, to turn, you can clearly see it.

 

If Coleman, Mykolenko, Beto and Calvert-Lewin are all out, I think our team should be on the lines of the Bournemouth 1-0  last game. Fill the midfield; do not worry about a striker.

 

Garner, Tarkowski, Branthwaite, Godfrey in back 4 — not ideal but I prefer Garner who is mobile and Godfrey at full-back. Hopefully Branthwaite is okay and it would be a bonus if Mykolenko or Coleman were fit.

 

Then I would have a midfield 6 of Harrison and McNeil on the flanks, Gueye and Gomes with Doucouré and Onana playing in tandem as the attacking midfielders cum strikers. It kind of worked in the last game last season and when we don't have the ball we can adopt the 4-6-0 shape and try and stop Liverpool from playing. It sounds desperate but that is were we are right now.

 

Gueye was superb against Forest. If he can keep it going on Wednesday with better distribution from Gomes and significant presence from Doucoure and Onana, maybe, just maybe, Liverpool would have to rely on the referee and VAR siding with them yet again.

 

We need to try and keep it tight, keep it at 0-0 for as long as possible. If it goes to 0-1 keep it there as long as possible. This game is all about keeping the score down and moving on to the Brentford game. Who knows — if the game is close with 10 minutes to go, bring on Chermiti.

 

We would have a bit of height and Onana could cause a few problems up top with his height. And obviously, if we can win a few set pieces, we just might cause them a problem. But my feeling is fill the midfield and make it hard for them.

 

If we can get through this game reasonably intact with no further injuries or sendings-off we can hopefully have a couple of the injured players back for Brentford, another massive game.

 

But please, Sean Dyche, don't make it an extremely long night even before a ball is kicked. Everyone can see the problems with playing Ashley Young — and you must also.

 

In the meantime, don't forget to sign Kevin Ratcliffe's petition about getting rid of Masters!

 

COYB!