Porto a little too good for Everton in The Algarve

A winger, pace and skill, seemed to do well on his short-term loan last season (personally, I much prefer short-term loans to season long ones for player development). Anybody with any further knowledge of the man?

Anthony is well regarded at Goodison, big strong forward with plenty of skill, not afraid to shoot from distance, can make as well score goals.

He was forming a good working relationship with Fraser Hornby at the end of last season when he suffered a bad ankle injury; he is just coming back from that. Yes keep your eye on Evans, he is still only nineteen, he could get one or two games next season. By the way, he is more of a striker than a winger, and he is always looking for the ball, never goes missing.

I don't know what position Connolly will finish up in, midfield or full-back, but I prefer him to Robinson; he looks more of a footballer to me, with an eye for goals.

You also mention that he is always looking for the ball, which is a plus in my estimation. I have always liked Dowell, but he does tend to 'disappear' in games, and unlike young Evans, very rarely goes looking to get the ball back once dispossessed.

I think Connolly is a bit like Alan Harper – you could play him anywhere and he'd put in a good solid shift.

Great to have someone like that in the squad but being so versatile maybe not great for the lad himself.

I've watched all the pre-season friendlies and have suddenly come to the realisation that I don't once remember seeing him playing.

They might only be friendly matches but I just don't see enough goals in the team next season.

Richarlison might add a bit more but seriously think we lack a top top striker.

Tosun showed some excellent touches in the first half but his lack of mobility is a worry. He's never going to win us a game on his own.

Baines struggled in the second half and was caught out in behind several times. One such time led to the goal. Digne looks to be a more than adequate replacement, should we sign him.

On the other side, Coleman's lack of natural ability was quite evident tonight against technically superior players. His game has never been technical and he will improve with fitness.

Overall a decent display, especially in the first half but we need more goals in the squad. We need a mobile striker who can run in behind and down the channels and we need a play-maker who can find him. We should swerve Richarlison. The inflated price aside, he's not what we need.

The positives are that we should be better with Sigurdsson, Richarlison, Walcott and Lookman in the squad.

I thought Sandro put a decent shift in. He's a grafter and I think he might be retained. I'd like to see him played centrally. He is meant to be a striker, after all. He's not gonna get ahead of Walcott, Lookman and Richarlison out wide.

Early days but it's hard to see where / when the nous and character, required to make a solid challenge on the top 6, will come from.

Long way to go; we must give Silva time and patience is needed. I sense though and understandably many see this as the same old, same old..

The negatives – everything else.

Don't know how much we're paying Silva, but boy is he going to earn it coaching this squad.

Everton pack all the punch of a box of Farley's Rusks and, aside from the 25-goal Lukaku seasons we had, it's pretty much looking back to what we are used to and hard to see next season being much different on the goalscoring front.

Another goal surrendered by Tom Davies losing the ball in centre midfield. How many times? I know the lad is still young, but for me he is too much of a liability with possession to be a regular starter. I compare him with a player like Luka Modric, who never wastes the ball. He had to be a benchmark for Tom to emulate.

I hope now that the manager has seen enough of Kevin Mirallas to write him off. He has also given Dowell, Sandro and Besic enough of a chance to make his mind up about these guys. Is Sandro worth a salary which is maybe 5 times that of Dowell? Probably not.

Losing Lukaku and replacing him with Tosun isn't going to be the answer. We need goals from the midfield.

From the pre-season games I have seen, Besic has done his case no harm. The rest need to pull their socks up.

It's going to be an interesting first couple of months.

To truly make an impression in attack, I think we need Walcott, Lookman and Richarlison to really add some pace to this team. I can't see any pace coming from our midfield.

I'd like to see the new lads in sharpish and a game or two together as a starting 11 before 11 August.

I'm going to stick to the positives – I have been very impressed with Mo Besic, I think he has done enough to play a part this season. Tosun is a good footballer, but was too isolated tonight, needs more bodies around him. Hopefully this will be the case when Walcott, Lookman, Richarlison are available for selection again.

I thought we were well organised and, even though we lost the game, I don't think there would have been many complaints if the score would have ended as the reverse. I know there are many on here who say it's more of the same, but I can see green shoots starting to appear. The players certainly have a better attitude, we definitely look more organised and we seem to be passing the ball around well at this stage.

The things that are letting us down are the odd moments of being sloppy in possession which tonight cost us a goal. Lots of work to do, but I'm certainly not worried, at the moment at least!

I have said it a couple of times – the season starts in less than 3 weeks and we need to have any new signings in place before that, so that the team that goes to Wolves don't have new players just signed a couple of days before, or hours before the window closes.

It will be interesting if nothing else to see if Tosun is paired up with Richarlison or Walcott in the next two friendlies, or Niasse and one of those others. This is depending on Walcott's fitness and the signing of Richarlison of course.

However, no goals at all in two games, especially yesterday against mediocre opposition, is scary.

Sometimes pre-season games can be misleading but we have seen this same Everton squad play this way before and a lot has to change to convince everyone who watches them that they can be competitive when push comes to shove in a few weeks.

Sigh.

We desperately need a decent striker.

But as usual he had 1/3 OK/good stuff, 2/3 not so much. I still can't understand why he keeps ignoring invites for balls out to the left wing, but instead turns inside every time... It's almost as if he hates the thought of anyone else giving a cross from there...

SA drained the life out of the club so I'm glad he's gone, but no need to look backwards at his reign. Koeman caused far more damage by blowing a fortune on players who are not good enough for the first team or better than our youngsters.

On another note, Tosun's control with four Porto players around him, to bring the ball down in the box from Coleman's lob, dink past one and make space and hit the post was quite sublime.

But ya made me laugh...

Yes, the squad is pretty dire but that is what Sam inherited; he brought in Walcott and Tosun, who are defo 2 of our betters players.

Allardyce was only here for a few months. If you want to lay the blame anywhere, try Koeman & Walsh to begin with. But it goes way beyond them two also, the club's expectations were lowered years ago.

Give the new man time and hopefully we will start to move in the right direction.

For years we have bought Man Utd rejects and sold our best players. We now have a mediocre squad with the best players too old.

Step up the transfer emperor and control freak who has been the blight on the club for 20 empty years.

The RS buy top quality while we overpay for average players. That is not and was not Koeman's fault, who was begging for a Lukaku replacement until the day he was sacked.

I'm all for giving Silva the time he needs to achieve this, but he's already made the first mistake of his reign by not swatting up on the squad over the past 9 months. It was probably the worst-kept secret that he would be Everton Manager coming into this season, so I would have expected a professional to have a clear idea of exactly who he wants and who he doesn't.

Unfortunately, judging by the sheer desperation on his and the backroom staffs faces during the Algarve Football Cup, the penny's finally dropped. Hence, the desperation of the incoming signing of another bang average player, for double what he's worth.

Add to the mix, the fact that we're now on our second Director of Football who's struggled badly to attract the type of player that would actually improve our squad (mainly due to the fact that players of this generation have no idea who we are, due to the fact we haven't achieved anything in their lifetime).

Unfortunately, because so many of the deadwood have been with us for so long or have so badly underachieved, they're value has evaporated and therefore are just as worthless to anybody else.

I fear, if we don't sell some of the current crop of underachievers pronto, we may suffer the same fate with those players in a year or two's time.

On one hand fans blame Koeman and Walsh (which I do to a big extent ) but the same fans then say we have some class players that are underperforming; they crow about future stars Lookman, Calvert-Lewin, Pickford and some fans can't get enough of the likes of Gueye without thinking it was Koeman who bought them.

The reality is, we cannot keep going through managers, the buck needs to stop with the players at some point and they need to start taking responsibility for not doing the basics required of a professional high (massively) paid Premier League footballer which are all too often including giving possession away aimlessly and endlessly or defenders losing focus.

How many managers do we need to stop our strikers falling over in front of goal and scuffing shots? Surely a professional footballer can do the basics of hitting a ball cleanly without a man telling him?

Point is, we can blame Koeman, Martinez, Walsh, Allardyce but the players get an easy ride and did get an easy ride right throughout last season.

Time to set foot on that pitch and have a bit of pride in yourselves this season, lads.

We need a director in the midfield to link it all together and he would be perfect.

I haven't read any quotes from Marco Silva – has he commented yet?

What is obvious and has been for a couple of seasons is the absence of a quality and forceful central midfielder. Martin (#8) wants Mooy from Huddersfield; I wouldn't say no to him either, looks like a player who makes others up their game.

A striker who can score, a new centre-back and left-back are mandatory in this window. Anything else will be a bonus. The team will struggle without bringing in those three players.

For me, the disappointment of the weekend was the pretty abysmal showing in the 'reserve game' on Saturday where I saw nothing to indicate Allardyce was wrong to ignore 'Unsie's Marvels'.

Even the much-hyped Dowell was average at best and the absence of a 'third choice ' goalkeeper raised questions about the industry of the new DoF!

Well, apart from the game in Austria, we have now had 3 games and scored only 1 goal against Bury. And therein lies the problem: none of our front 3 or midfield 3 have anything like the number of goals needed to move this club into a top 6 position.

I know Silva will play a more attacking and expansive game than either Koeman or Allardyce. But we need more firepower in the way of goals. Gueye, Schneiderlin, Sigurdsson, Bolasie, and Davies just don't score enough goals.

Some encouraging signs in that first half with intelligent play by Dowell, Sandro, Davies and Tosun. Mirallas was aggressive and direct and looked as if he might be a factor when the season starts. We weren't half bad but I would dearly like us to win a game like this instead of concocting a loss against a worse team. I don't get the headline, "Porto too good".

How come our forwards seem to be blessed with pin-ball control? First touch seems to knock the ball 6ft away and opposition come away with the ball. Last player I remember with the same gift was Jim Pearson in the '70s.

However, the manager sets the tone for this and it's been going downhill since Martinez was here. He allowed the players to become unfit, lazy, team spirit completely died and that has carried on to this day. For some reason all the managers since Moyes was here haven't been able to get the players to gel and fight for lost causes and to give everything on the pitch.

Hopefully Silva can give that back to us, a team that will fight to the end and not give up. The teams have been way too flaky for me in recent years. The players are as culpable as the managers but the managers set the tone and have allowed the players to become this lazy.

I have been saying since Lukaku was banging them in we need goalscoring midfield players and not to just rely on one player to convert them. Mirallas at his best was a good example and Fellaini also chipped in.

It says a lot for our current status that Fellaini would probably not come back even at the wrong side of 30.

This side is anaemic in front of goal and porous defensively. A recipe for disaster.

I think Silva had a realisation last night as he was seen pulling his Everton shirt out and pointing the badge out to the players.

On another note, anyone see the news that Lukaku is looking for a bigger country to play for. Lol

The same Victor Yu who said Sandro was going to be a star. Absolutely wrong on both counts.

I thought, like many others, we started off quite brightly, but instead of building on that, they seemed to get progressively worse.

Porto upped their game second half, and after the goal, it's as if the towel went in. I know it's pre-season, but the real thing is only a couple of matches away, and although some personnel are or were missing, it doesn't exactly signal that they are anywhere near ready.

Tosun will benefit greatly with these 3 around him. That's before I mention Richarlison.

Keep the faith all.

We all know that many of these same players have to prove themselves for the new regime and to a degree it was obvious a lot of them tried hard.

The failings are there for all to see especially on offence and yes perhaps when the first Premier League game comes around they may be more of a threat with Walcott and the incoming Richarlison.

One can also point to the fact that Gana and Gylfi were absent but even with their presence will Everton's midfield be strong enough.

They don't seem to have a really classy, powerful guy who can make runs forward and get a defence back-pedalling such as a Dembele (Spurs).

What we have seen so far is an inability to really get at a team who parks the bus. The build up is far too slow and they take far too many passes just to get forward ten yards.

When you have some quick players going forward you can play a different game by sitting back and catching teams on the break like Liverpool did last season.

I noticed that Everton were particularly vulnerable to this in both weekend games especially with Baines who now doesn't have the recovery prowess he used too after venturing upfield.

At this stage, I can only see more of the same happening unless Silva acts quickly and positively to the problems we all can see and have seen over the last few seasons or more.

We're also well short of our first 11 and Porto are a decent side. Big, strong and well drilled. We're still working out our new way of playing under Silva but the signs were encouraging and way better than the dross under he who shall never be mentioned.

Friendlies are long forgotten once the season starts anyway and don't really really much with regard to how the PL games are going to pan out.

We do look like we're a striker short though.

Whilst our possibly best 2 outfield players, Walcott and Sigurdsson haven't played yet, it is still worrying that we have only scored 1 goal against Bury in the last 3 games.

Tosun does not yet appear to me to have found his fitness or sharpness but, as I said last season, he is not capable of playing upfront by himself. He needs support either in a 4-4-2 or 4-4-1-1 formation. He was unlucky against Porto but his choices weren't always the best.

We need 2 upfront whether that involves a No 10 or not to win games. The truth is that we played well against all 3 teams and should have won 2 easily and possibly with better goalbound shots could have won all 3.

I am also worried about the defence, having let Porto off the hook, it was clear that they would come at us after half time. They scored within 5 minutes. Whether that was the fault of Baines or, as Darren Griffiths said, Keane, I'm not sure. We need a new central defender as soon as possible because we are definitely lacking in pace apart from Mason Holgate.

The main positives are the performance of Sandro getting better and easily the best player on the night. Oumar came on late but probably our best striker and Mo Besic, fantastic against Bury and Lille and looked good if only for a few minutes against Porto.

No coincidence that Mo, Oumar and Mason were substitutes coming on late as we looked for a goal.

Porto won the league last year? so a result in which we were probably the better team not that bad. We should have realised that we would be under pressure for at least 20/30 minutes. It was how we withstood it.

Lille beat them. We would have beaten Lille but for a goal being disallowed when it should clearly have stood. Lack of goals has, however, been a feature of our recent performances.

I was grimacing and very frustrated with the football, let alone Silva because our finishing was poor. The present group of players are quite actually good. I can remember squads in the past far worse than the present.

In the first half, this was more evident, and we were more dynamic, getting the ball forward and really going at them. In the second half, the tempo dropped. Porto pressed us harder, and mistakes were made. Silva was clearly not happy, and this shows that there is work to do and the players were not carrying the plan out.

Of the side last night, the back four was pretty much our best back four. Coleman was okay, but not at his best, and didn't quite do his thing. Baines continued to show he's far from finished but faded in the second half. Jagielka was his usual self. I don't think he's done, and still is Jagielka even if he is starting to creak. Sure we need better but he doesn't give me the biggest concern.

Instead I reserve that for Keane. I only hope that we didn't see Holgate as he was carrying a knock. Why he had a cameo and instead we saw Williams and Pennington and then Jagielka and Keane, I would like to know. For me, Holgate might not be the best right now, but he could be the best next season, and I think this is how we need to be thinking. Playing players now, with a view to what it can do for them in the longer term.

I thought Schneiderlin and Davies did alright first half, and then Schneiderlin went crap as he got overcome by the Porto energy in the second half. Davies looked a little overwhelmed but mainly due to seeming like he was outnumbered.

Ahead, I thought Dowell did alright first half but looked out of his depth second half. But he's young and needs games. Sandro was impressive on the right, but only when you consider that he was considered to be a Sunday League level playerz. Is he good enough to play on the right of a front three against Wolves, no, I'd take Walcott every time. And I think Walcott Would have made a bigger difference. On the left Mirallas is continuing to show that he's not done yet. Does that mean he like Sandro is good enough to start against Wolves, no, it does not. It just means he is an option, but we lacked a cutting edge and Ricarlison or similar in his spot can provide that.

Tosun had a mixed game. There was one magical moment, and he came close. The rest of the time he struggled to produce much else. But that's why, for me Calvert-Lewin is a better all-round player for the side. The difference is that Tosun can produce those magical moments, and more often than not, it's a goal. Calvert-Lewin lacks that quality. I believe that he can still develop it though.

All in all, I was pleased. We outplayed Porto in the first half, we tired in the second. They are the perennial Portuguese champions, champions league veterans, and we were lacking 3 of our first choice front 4 (Bolasie, Walcott and Sigurdsson) and when you consider that we were lacking a cutting edge, missing so many of your best attackers is bound to have a difference. Sure Bolasie was poor last season, but whatever way you want to look at it, we played Mirallas on the left, due to injury to Lookman, Calvert-Lewin and Bolasie, and even Sigurdsson being not ready for a game.

Work in progress means we need to continue to make progress, and I am confident that we will do so. Let's worry about the Wolves game, and just let pre-season be used for development and fitness, rather than worrying about the results.