Summary
The headline is that we defended well for approximately four-fifths of the season and then suffered a sharp, costly collapse over the final seven games. We finished 13th on 49 points (W13 D10 L15), conceding 50 goals against 47 scored for a goal difference of −3.
For most of the year we were one of the more resolute units in the Premier League: through the first 31 fixtures we had kept all 11 of our clean sheets and held opponents to around 1.2 goals a game. We were, at one stage with seven games to go, competing for possibly a top-five place and openly targeting European qualification.
That challenge un-ravelled after the March international break. We took just 3 points from the final 21 available, failing to win any of our last seven matches, and missed Europe by four points.
The defensive symptoms were stark and specific: we conceded 10 goals in the 76th minute or later across our final eight games, double the five we had conceded in that phase across the first 29, and became the first side in Premier League history to concede 90th-minute-or-later winning goals in three consecutive fixtures.
My own view is that our strong defensive record flattered the underlying process, and that the collapse was largely self-inflicted through squad management rather than a sudden loss of defensive quality.
We conceded around 7 goals fewer than our expected-goals-against model predicted, an over-performance driven above all by Jordan Pickford, who led the league for goals prevented. When that overperformance regressed and accumulated fatigue set in among the smallest core squad in the division, results corrected violently. The remedies are squad depth, a recognised right-back, the return to fitness of Jarrad Branthwaite, and rotation discipline.
Headline defensive metrics
The table below summarises our key defensive indicators with league context.
| Metric | Everton | League context / rank |
|---|---|---|
| Final league position | 13th | of 20 |
| Points | 49 | 13 W · 10 D · 15 L |
| Goals conceded (GA) | 50 | mid-table for goals against |
| Goals scored (GF) | 47 | goal difference −3 |
| Expected goals against (xGA) | c.57 | c.1.5 per game |
| Clean sheets | 11 | all 11 kept in the first 31 games |
| Goalkeeper goals prevented | +5 and rising | led the Premier League (to spring) |
| Total duels contested / won | 4,053 / 2,070 | 1st in the Premier League for both |
| Defensive pressures | Very high | 2nd in the Premier League |
| Clearances per game | 30.1 | 6th |
| Squad rotation / substitutions | Lowest | 20th, smallest core used |
Read in isolation, several of these numbers are encouraging. The duel and pressure volumes are the highest in the league; 50 conceded is a serviceable mid-table return; 11 clean sheets is solid. The analytical work in the sections that follow explains why Everton should treat that encouragement with caution.
Comparative positioning in the Premier League
On goal difference we finished mid-table at −3, comfortably clear of the relegated trio (West Ham −19, Burnley −37, Wolves −41) but well adrift of the European places. Against the benchmark we should hold ourselves to, the cluster of clubs that competed for Europe (Bournemouth, Sunderland, Brighton, Brentford, Chelsea, Fulham), our defence was broadly comparable on goals conceded, and our problem was as much the eight-to-ten points we shed late in matches as any raw defensive shortfall.
Where we genuinely led the league was in physical and territorial output: first for total duels contested (4,053) and duels won (2,070), and second for defensive pressures. This is the statistical fingerprint of David Moyes’ system, a compact, aggressive, hard-working block. It is a strength, but as we demonstrate below, it carried a hidden cost.
Two seasons within a season
No single statistic captures our year better than the contrast between the first 31 games and the last seven. We did not gradually decline; we fell off a cliff.
Our goals-conceded rate rose from around 1.2 per game to 1.9 per game; our late-goal concessions doubled; and our clean-sheet count went from 11 to zero. The specific defeats that defined the run-in, a 3–1 lead surrendered to a 3–3 draw against Manchester City, and stoppage-time winners conceded against Liverpool, West Ham and Sunderland, were not bad luck repeated. They were a recurring, systemic failure to see games out.
System or individuals? attributing performance
So was our defensive performance attributable to our defensive system, (the manager) or down to individual players?
The good period was propped up by individual goalkeeping
For most of the season we conceded somewhat fewer goals than the quality of chances against us merited. Our expected goals against ran at around 1.5 per game (roughly 57 across the season), yet we conceded 50.
That 7-goal gap is clear evidence that our results outran our underlying defensive process. The largest single explanation is Jordan Pickford, who topped the Premier League’s goals-prevented charts (over five goals saved above an average keeper by the spring, on a 66% save rate across all 38 games and every minute played). In other words, a good portion of our defensive reputation this season was earned in our own goalmouth rather than in front of it, indeed, Pickford alone accounts for most of the over-performance. That is a tribute to an outstanding goalkeeper, but it is not a repeatable, structural foundation.
The bad period was a failure of system and squad management
When over-performance regresses, it tends to do so suddenly, and ours coincided with the point in the season when our system’s hidden cost came due. We asked the league’s highest physical output (those duel and pressure volumes) from the league’s smallest and least-rotated squad. We finished last for squad rotation and substitutions. The result, predictably, was physical and mental burnout precisely in the closing stages of matches, which is exactly where the late goals arrived. The collapse, then, was less about defenders suddenly forgetting how to defend and more about an exhausted XI, an unchanged approach across seven straight games, and the maths of xG catching up with us at once.
The central-defensive pairings
Which central pairing produced the best results?
The data carries an important caveat before any verdict: because Jarrad Branthwaite was available for less than ten league games, we never had a meaningful sample of our highest-ceiling partnership, so the question is partly answered by absence.
| Central defender | PL starts | Profile & analytical read |
|---|---|---|
| James Tarkowski (33) | 37 | Elite in the box, 96th–98th percentile for aerial duels, clearances and blocks. Lacks recovery pace; disciplinary record a concern (6–7 yellows); prone to the occasional high-cost error in key moments. |
| Michael Keane | 29 | Near ever-present in Branthwaite’s absence; dependable and a set-piece scorer, but also slow. Tarkowski’s underlying numbers tend to dip when the two are paired. |
| Jarrad Branthwaite (England) | 7 | Our highest-ceiling defender, left-sided, quick, composed in possession. Available for only 10 league games through injury, returning in late January. |
| Jake O’Brien | 35 (mostly RB) | A natural centre-back deployed at right-back all season because no specialist RB was signed, a square peg that weakened two positions at once. |
| Reece Welch | 0 | Academy cover; minimal exposure. |
Verdict. By volume and by raw results, the Tarkowski & Keane partnership presided over our strong first 31 games and almost all of our clean sheets, so on a purely results basis it ‘produced the best results.’
But that finding is confounded: it was very nearly the only pairing available, and it was flattered by Pickford’s over-performance. Its structural flaw is decisive: two ageing, slow centre-backs operating behind Moyes’s aggressive line are repeatedly exposed in transition and in the final stages of games, the Haaland goal moments after we made it 3–1 against City being the textbook example.
The pairing , our underlying numbers call for, is one that keeps Tarkowski’s aerial and box dominance but adds recovery pace and left-sided composure alongside it, i.e. Branthwaite alongside Tarkowski, with Jake O’Brien as the athletic third option once a specialist right-back frees him to return to the centre.
Strengths to build on
- Work-rate and aggression: league-leading duel and pressure volumes give us a clear, coachable identity and a high baseline of defensive effort.
- Goalkeeping: Pickford is an elite, durable shot-stopper and a genuine points-winner; he is a foundation to build in front of, not a problem to solve.
- Aerial and box defending: with Tarkowski and Keane we are among the best in the league at defending the penalty area from open play and winning first contacts.
- Organisation when fresh and at full strength: the first-31-game record shows the block works when legs are available, our away form (W7 D5 L6) was actually stronger than our home form, underlining that the structure travels.
Weaknesses
- Game management / closing out matches: our defining flaw, a Premier-League-record three consecutive late winners conceded, and 10 late goals in the final eight games.
- Squad depth and rotation: the smallest core in the league, run into the ground; this is the root cause of the run-in collapse and is fixable in the market and on the training ground.
- Pace in central defence: the first-choice pairing is too slow for an aggressive line; we are vulnerable to balls in behind and to counter-attacks.
- Set-piece defending: we conceded repeatedly from corners, including on the final day; a recurring, specific and coachable vulnerability.
- Structural reliance on over-performance: an xGA of 57 means the ‘true’ level of the defence is somewhat more exposed than 50 conceded suggests; without recruitment we should expect further regression next season.
- Full-back composition: the failure to sign a right-back last summer forced a centre-back (O’Brien) into the role, weakening both positions.
Why we conceded so heavily in the final games
Pulling the threads together, the run-in collapse was the product of several compounding factors rather than any single cause:
- Fatigue and burnout, the primary driver. The league’s highest physical workload carried by its smallest, least-rotated squad meant legs went in exactly the late-game phase where our goals were conceded.
- Regression to expected goals, the season-long c.7-goal over-performance, most of it Pickford’s, normalised at the worst possible time, so chances we had been surviving began to be punished.
- Game-management and psychology, a visible inability to control leads and closing minutes once the pressure of the European chase intensified, then deflated.
- A static tactical response, no meaningful formational or personnel change across the final seven games as the pattern repeated.
- Set-piece fragility and central-defensive pace, the specific defensive mechanisms most often exploited late in games.
Notably, this was not simply a ‘Branthwaite-injury’ story. The defence had in fact been resolute before his late-January return; the collapse came later and is better explained by accumulated load and regression than by any one absence, though his fitness next season is clearly part of the solution.
The following summer priorities follow directly from the analysis above and are intended to convert a defence that over-performed into one that is structurally sound.
- Sign a specialist right-back. This single move returns Jake O’Brien to his natural centre-back role and repairs two positions at once.
- Add genuine pace and depth at centre-back. Protect a Branthwaite & Tarkowski first-choice partnership and end the over-reliance on the slow Tarkowski & Keane partnership.
- Broaden the squad to enable rotation. Directly target the root cause of the collapse; set a clear minutes-management protocol with the head coach for the final third of the season.
- Invest in set-piece defending. A dedicated coaching focus and, if needed, recruitment of aerially dominant cover, given the repeated corner concessions.
- Plan for goalkeeping regression. Pickford masked the better part of seven goals of chance quality; recruitment must lower the volume and quality of shots we face rather than assume that level of shot-stopping recurs.
- Manage the Tarkowski transition. Now 33 and recently extended, he should be progressively partnered and rotated rather than asked to start 35-plus games behind an aggressive line.
In conclusion, Moyes’ career has largely been built on, and his relative successes, attributed to his defensive expertise and durability. The evidence from last season was that it was Pickford’s brilliance especially earlier in the season that produced better than expected performance, and that Moyes rigidity and failure to rotate his squad lead to the massive drop off in performance at the end of the season.