Everton’s winter form is a real worry

Everton boss Ronald Koeman must find a way to get the best out of his mercurial attacking players

Everton suffered their fourth consecutive away defeat in Saturday’s 3-2 defeat to Watford, and now find themselves five games without a win in the Premier League.

The Toffees are still ninth in the Premier League table but their winter results has been relegation form and the lack of points amassed in recent weeks in a real worry.

Everton are porous at the back

After picking up two clean sheets from their first four Premier League games of the season, Everton have since struggled to shut sides out. The Toffees have gone five games without a clean sheet in the league, and have managed just one shut-out since September. Despite signing former Swansea City defender Ashley Williams in the summer to bolster the backline, Everton have been more exposed than ever and are currently leaking goals on a regular basis.

After the Watford defeat, Everton have now conceded 11 goals in their last five Premier League games, and the amount of times they’ve shipped a goal to a side in the bottom-half of the table this season will concern manager Ronald Koeman – Middlesbrough, Bournemouth, Crystal Palace, Burnley and Swansea City have breached the Everton backline in the league. Reports are linking Everton to Southampton’s Virgil Van Dijk but they may need more than the talented Dutch centre-back to improve their fortunes at the back.

Lack of creativity and over-reliance on Romelu Lukaku for goals

Everton manager Ronald Koeman has already spoken out about the lack of goals from the rest of the squad, but still the Toffees are relying heavily on striker Romelu Lukaku. “Of course, you’d like many players to score more goals. The players around Lukaku need to show more productivity. There is no pressure on Lukaku. It’s one of his best qualities. We need to create more and we need to score more goals,” said Koeman back in October, but still the similar issues remain.

During their five-game winless run, Everton have scored just four goals. Romelu Lukaku – who has scored and created 63% of Everton’s Premier League goals – has accounted for half the goals. Everton’s defeat to Watford was, in fact, only the second time since September that they had scored two or more goals in the league, and behind Lukaku in the scoring charts is Gareth Barry with just two goals. The lack of goals has contributed to a lack of wins, and Everton are 18th in the form table for points picked up since October. Everton are 7/2 to finish in the bottom-half in the Premier League this season, but can they turn things around.