David Moyes has only been in the job for a month after returning to Goodison Park as manager, but three successive Premier League wins have Everton fans dreaming of brighter times ahead.
A lot has changed since the original date of the first Merseyside derby of the 2024-25 Premier League season.
When Storm Darragh intervened to postpone the 7 December clash, Sean Dyche had led his Everton side to just three wins across their 14 Premier League games to start the campaign. Now, Dyche has gone, and former boss David Moyes has returned after an 11-year absence to lead them to a three-game winning streak in the league before Wednesday’s rearranged clash with Liverpool.
It’s fitting that Moyes – the only surviving manager to take charge of at least 500 games for Everton – will lead them into battle in what will be the final Merseyside derby to be played at Goodison Park.
While Everton’s league position may make it seem like their position as an ever-present Premier League club is a precarious one, their points tally tells a different story.
The three league wins overseen by Moyes against Tottenham Hotspur, Brighton and Leicester City mean they may be just two spots above the relegation zone, but there is a gap of nine points between them and 18th-place Leicester. Plus, they have a game in hand, with the derby giving them the opportunity to stretch that gap to 12 points.
When Dyche was sacked on 9 January just hours before their FA Cup third round tie against Peterborough United, that gap between Everton and the relegation zone was just a point, while only bottom club Southampton had won fewer games (1) and scored fewer goals (12) than them (3 wins, 15 goals).
Of course, this isn’t the first time that Moyes has returned to manage a former Premier League employer. The experienced coach had two spells at West Ham United in the competition and did even better in his second spell (1.36 points per game) than he did in his first (1.22), while he led the Hammers to European glory in the 2023 Conference League final versus Fiorentina in Prague.
There’s little expectation that Moyes will do better second time around at Everton, with the club in a very different place to where it was in his first spell between 2002 and 2013. Across those 11 years, Moyes led Everton to their best-ever Premier League finish (fourth in 2004-05) and nine of their 13 best points tallies in a Premier League season.
Stability is what Everton need right now, and so far Moyes has given them that and more. But – aside from what they will hope is a blip in their FA Cup fourth round defeat to Bournemouth at the weekend – how has he changed the fortunes of the club since taking over on 11 January?
It’s difficult to read too much into a spell of four league games, but Moyes has seemingly pushed his Everton side to take the game to their opponents from the off.
The Toffees’ first-half performances under the veteran boss have been excellent, scoring seven goals before half-time and yet to concede. Even in Moyes’ opening game – a 1-0 defeat at Aston Villa – they went in goalless at the break. They have dominated their opponent in the first half in their most recent three wins.
The 4-0 win over Leicester at Goodison Park on 1 February saw Abdoulaye Doucouré open the scoring after just 10.18 seconds, the fourth fastest goal in Premier League history. It was followed by Beto’s first goal of the game in the sixth minute and another in first-half added time. The 3-2 win over Spurs on 19 January had also seen them go 3-0 up before half-time.
Of course, improved first-half performances also go some way into improving game state. One of Everton’s problems under Dyche was that although they were difficult to break down, they also relied heavily on set-piece goals due to their lack of open-play attacking threat. It wasn’t so bad if they held a lead in games and weren’t necessarily looking to commit men forward to try and score, but it wasn’t a position Dyche’s side were in that often.
In 2024-25 under Dyche, Everton led matches for just 370 minutes overall, including added time in both halves (19.8% of match time). Since Moyes came in, they have already led for 257 minutes inside four games and been in a winning position for 63.1% of match time overall. They haven’t been in a losing position across any of their last three league matches.
Getting ahead in games and controlling the first half against opponents has enabled them to be less frantic with their goalscoring opportunities, too.
Since Moyes’ first game, Everton have had the best quality non-penalty shots on average (0.15 xG per shot) and had the second-highest conversion rate in the Premier League from these shots (18.9%).
In 19 Premier League matches under Dyche in 2024-25, this was the polar opposite, with Everton averaging the worst shot quality (0.08 xG per shot) and having the second-worst shot conversion rate from non-penalty situations (6.9%) behind only bottom side Southampton (6.4%).
The overall style in open play hasn’t seemed drastically different, but again comparing a four-game spell under Moyes to the 19 matches under Dyche this season isn’t entirely fair.
However, there are encouraging signs for fans who want to see a higher intensity side where passes are zipped around the floor rather than the preference to go long.
Everton have averaged more high turnovers per game under Moyes (8.3) than Dyche (7.2) in the league this season, while they have averaged nearly 10 more pressures per game (205.3 vs 195.9) in his four games in charge. Their start distance – the average distance from their own goal that a team starts their open-play sequences – is nearly two metres higher up the pitch on average in Moyes’ four-game spell than in the 19 games under Dyche, too.
There’s not been a dramatic shift in how much quicker Moyes’ Everton have moved up the pitch compared to Dyche’s (1.77 metres per second upfield vs 1.91 m/s). And they have slightly increased their average passes per open-play sequence under their returning boss (3.1 under Moyes vs 2.8 under Dyche), but again, four games isn’t a sufficient sample size to really make clear conclusions.
One encouraging sign for Everton fans who want to see less of the ball in the air came in their last league game against Leicester, when they played five through-balls in open play, the pick of the bunch being James Garner’s sensational assist from inside his own half for Beto’s goal to put them 3-0 up. It was the most they’ve attempted in a game since October 2023.
It was common to see a Dyche-led Everton side attempt to get the ball into wide areas and float crosses in, but that has also changed so far under Moyes. Their average open-play crosses per game have fallen from 12.7 under their former manager across his 19 games in charge to just 7.5 per game with Moyes.
Two players who have seen a lot more of the ball under Moyes are centre-backs James Tarkowski and Jarrad Branthwaite. Both have seen a huge rise in average touches per 90 since Moyes arrived, with Tarkowski averaging 13 more (65 vs 52) and Branthwaite averaging 12 more (63 vs 51). They are encouraged to carry the ball forward rather than launch a long ball into the channels at the first opportunity. This has been noticeable with Tarkowski, in particular, who has moved with the ball 15 more metres upfield per 90 in the last four games than in the previous 19.
Jake O’Brien has come in from the cold to be the preferred option as right-back rather than the aging Ashley Young. The Irishman, signed from Lyon in the summer, has already played more Premier League minutes under Moyes (275) than he did with Dyche in charge (34).
On the left, Vitalii Mykolenko has been encouraged to get forward too, with both of his home appearances under Dyche in the Premier League seeing his average position inside the opposition half. The Ukrainian may be missing for the Merseyside derby, however, following a calf injury.
Iliman Ndiaye is another who Moyes seems to be getting the best out of. He’s scored in each of Everton’s three Premier League wins under the new boss, while his goal tally in all competitions since Dyche left stands at four across 519 minutes compared to four in 1,688 mins under him in 2024-25. Playing in the pocket just behind either Beto or Dominic Calvert-Lewin in the number nine role, Ndiaye is a tricky, nimble player who will cause problems for most Premier League defences when given the chance.
Arguably one of Everton’s best performances under Dyche came in last season’s Merseyside derby at Goodison Park as they ran out 2-0 victors. In that game, they came flying out of the blocks to stun their rivals. “You lost the league at Goodison Park” rang out in the home end around the famous old stadium in the closing minutes.
Moyes may have won just three of his 22 Premier League Merseyside derbies in charge of Everton between 2002 and 2013 (D7 L12), but he’s improved Everton enough in a short space of time to make Liverpool wary of their last ever trip to Goodison Park.
No league titles will be lost on Wednesday night, but Moyes and Everton could give Liverpool’s rivals at the top something to cheer about by denying them the chance to pull nine points clear.
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