We've not seen the best of Naismith!

Some Rangers fans I know used to rate him higher than Jelavic. Bad touches and bad passing are the signs of a player shorn of confidence and of form. you only have to see the difference in Jelavic over 12 months. I believe there's a player in there and we'd be a lot more fluid a team if we could put a real Number 10 behind the striker rather than a target-man midfielder.

Yet he looked decent in pre-season, and in the first few games (especially away at Villa). And, I suppose, he's been played out of position pretty much every time he's had the opportunity to get on the pitch since then.

I thought he might be a decent squad player, but, whatever the excuse, he's been largely awful.

While it hasn't worked out as I'd hoped, I still think he can do a job for us - remember, on Sunday that was the first time he'd really been allowed to play as he'd like, and he was nowhere near as bad in that game as many have made out. Jelavic could still be playing right now and not tuck away the one Naismith scored. Anichebe stank the place out, and perhaps if had the attitude and work-rate of Naismith (qualities I though we always admired at Goodison?) then he might actually begin to resemble a footballer.

At this level, players tend to do more or less OK if you give them the right job to do, so I hope any incoming manager that's aware of Naismith's pre-Everton days will know how to use him in that way, and more importantly, be willing to. While not an automatic choice, I think he can still be an important part of the squad.

Considering he's been played out of position all season Naismith doesn't have a bad ratio. Almost one in 3 whereas crowd favourite Mirallas is almost one in four as is Jelavic. COnsidering 2 of these goals were against Liverpool and Chelsea I can't understand why he gets the stick he does. Half the time he's not even playing. I hope the new manager gives him a go, we need more goals from somewhere and osmeone who can play behind the striker. Even if we went and bought a 20 goal a season striker (which Moyes did) if his service consists of trying to read Fellaini's flick ons then he's not going to score many. I hope our attacking structure and formaiton is the fist thing the manager fixes when he arrives. Would love to see either Mirallas or Naismith threading balls in for Jelvaic to tap in - functioning like a proper strike force should.

If you stuck Baines at right midfield, or Jags at centre forward, you wouldn't get the best out of them either and they would look pretty hopeless.

Fingers crossed the new manager will be able to get the best out him.

Cant wait to see how RVP goes next season...

Terry Conroy(Sky) reckons Stoke is too big a job for Neville.

However, perhaps if your analysis didn't just include the very limited stats which happen to reinforce your viewpoint, you might understand a bit more why "the crowd" hold the view they do.

As for Anichebe, he works hard and has very good physical attributes such as pace and strength which give us options. Importantly Anichebe has shown massive improvement over the player we were used to witnessing a few seasons ago.

You can still say Anichebe is not good enough, which I'd be inclined to agree with, but you can also see the guy getting a bit of confidence, sorting his head out and really start to bully defenders. He's shown some terrific individual goals in the past, such as one away in europe(Metalist?) and he has upped his work-rate and you can see his game has developed this season. He certainly has the ability if he is in the right frame of mind.

Naismith on the other hand has very few positive characteristics. One of the big problems is that he has absolutely no pace.....and that is a major weakness at the top level, especially for a forward. He's had a decent number of chances this season, counting substitute appearances, and his play has genuinely been poor. He's a hardworking decent professional, but he's not going to improve much and I'd rather see McAleny or someone from the youth setup given a go.

If we're looking for a creative attack minded player to thread through balls for Jelavic or Anichebe, I think we can afford to flog the usless Naismith and actually give some pitch-time to Barkley.

No, we've seen the worst!

Glad he wants to improve. Everyone should.

Hope he can get his scoring touch back. We need it.

Its really annoyed me how many chances he's been given this season considering how dire he's been. Then we have players like Oviedo who has shown plenty of promise in his brief cameos and hasn't been given a fair crack at all

Naismith, behind the Jelavic of last season(he's still there some where and a new coach will find him), will do okay.

The difference between Osman and Naismith are: Osman can actually do the basics of what a PL footballer should be able to do, such as control the ball and pass it etc. Naismith can't even seem to do the basics and he deserves all the abuse he gets here on TW, because don't forget he's got a good contract here at Everton. Yes we should get behind him when we're in the crowd and he's on the pitch, but we've got every right to slate his dire performances after the match

I know the Scottish League is like the Championship with less games, but what harm would it do to try? Jelavic and Naismith up front; Pienaar, Barkley, Gibson and Mirallas in midfield and Baines, Distin, Jags and Coleman in the back. I really don't understand why Moyes never tried this?

You're also correct that if you ignore all the stats that don't fit with your opinion, then Naismith doesn't actually look a bad player. How about looking at assists or sub appearances when considering what impact a player has had? Or you might also consider how important the goals have been. Mirallas certainly has scored some important goals for us where we were struggling to break down a side and he's scored a goal of individual brilliance, the like of which we've not seen since Kanchelskis.

I've criticised Moyes in the past so many times about playing players in the wrong position, so I know what you're getting at. However in Naismiths case, I really haven't seen enough of a reason to be keeping other players who've not been given a chance out of the squad.

If I'm being honest I'll say that Moyes favouritism and double standards hasn't done Naismith any favours. Had Moyes been rotating Naismith with Oviedo and Barkley, I suspect the fans(including me) would probably be on his back a bit less. Its not his fault, I know, but thats the reality of the situation. Fans know who they want to see on the pitch and seeing the same old shite given chance after chance, while other players are ignored is very frustrating.

Did I mention that neither of them can tackle?

We do pay for Naismith though! How much a a year do you think his wages cost us? Don't really give a shit what Jelavic thought about him playing in the Mickey Mouse League, Jelavic is also living on borrowed time in my opinion. Ordinary players can look like world beaters in the SPL, just look at players like Kris Boyd who scored over 30 goals every season for Rangers, then ends up in the championship playing for Midlesbough and can't hit a barn door

The ACL was a career ender. It is not now but look at who has had such an injury for us in recent years:

Jags - was hardly a ballerina so cannot be assessed on his balls skills.
Carsley - ditto - but he did take a long time to get back to his best and could be argued to have lost something.

Arteta - I think I am in the minority here, but the lad was a shadow of the player he was before. All the pace over 10 yards had gone. The trickery and movement he had before was gone. I have not seen him once take on a player and beat him for pace and trickery since. This was the player I used to love as a matador in the dark days who would have the ball in the fullback spot and fend off 4 opposition players with speed and trickery in a tight spot and outrageous slight of foot. He has never shown that since, though to be fair, he lost this part of the game once we got better and he actually had someone to pass to who would not lose the ball.

Yakubu - in my opinion never recovered and should have retired and counted the insurance money.

I'm certain I missed someone out. but in short, the ACL may not be the killer it once was but the best you can hope for is to be able to run and kick the ball but your range of movement is severely impacted.

Yakubu might have scored goals, but most of these were him sniffing out strikers goals, rather than examples of his pace, power and movement like before.

My point is not that these guys were awful post recovery but that they lost their full range of movement and so were incapable of being what they were before. Arteta being a great player was able to adapt and reinvent himself. However, as good as he is now, he is not the Matador that I loved.

Never thought Yakubu was much of a footballer, used to frustrate the hell out of me but he certainly knew where the onion sack was

And when it comes to Jelavic, he has already proved to us he can do it....just you wait and see what the new manager can make out of him.

I think you will be in for a surprise, as long as we get a sane manager thou, who let him play how he is supposed to play and not abuse him like the 'ol fella.