Everton Fans Already Enduring A Badly Run Club Didn't Need A ...

General view of a small flag with the Everton crest behind before the Premier League match at ... [+] Goodison Park, Liverpool. Picture date: Saturday October 7, 2023. (Photo by Nigel French/PA Images via Getty Images)

English Premier League club Everton FC has been docked 10 points following an investigation by an independent commission into the club’s breach of the league’s profit and sustainability rules.

The points deduction takes Everton into the relegation zone, down from 14 to four points, only ahead of bottom club Burnley on goal difference.

Everton says it will appeal the decision which it believes is “a wholly disproportionate and unjust sporting sanction”.

“Both the harshness and severity of the sanction imposed by the commission are neither a fair nor a reasonable reflection of the evidence submitted,” the club added in a statement.

The commission found Everton to be in breach of the profit and sustainability rules by exceeding the permitted threshold of £105 million ($131 million) in losses by £19.5 million ($24 million).

The findings state that Everton accepted it was in breach of the profit and sustainability rules but the club argued this was only to the extent of £9.7 million ($12 million).

Everton fans participate in a demonstration against the board of Everton ahead of the Premier League ... [+] match at Goodison Park, Liverpool. Picture date: Saturday February 18, 2023. (Photo by Peter Byrne/PA Images via Getty Images)

Everton’s owners have overseen a decline in the club’s fortunes through mismanagement, bad decisions, and careless spending which has led to a run of poor seasons on the field and now to this investigation and points deduction.

Everton was close to being relegated in the previous two seasons, remaining in the Premier League despite its owners and certainly not because of them.

Fans rallied around to motivate the team during those moments when the club was on the precipice, turning out in their numbers, not just to support the team in the stadium, but to create an atmosphere around Goodison Park.

These extraordinary shows of support certainly rubbed off on the players and gave them extra confidence, especially towards the end of the 2021/22 season.

These same supporters have regularly protested against their club’s owners in recent years. They didn’t need a Premier League commission to tell them how badly their club has been run.

Sadly it is those fans, who themselves have moved to force change at the top of the club and will have had no help from the authorities in their quest to do so, who will bear the brunt of any negative consequences as a result of the points deduction.

Following a decent start to the 2023/24 season under manager Sean Dyche, who took over from Frank Lampard in January 2023, there was a sense of optimism around Goodison that this season there might at least be some breathing space between Everton and the relegation battle.

It still isn’t the Premier League Everton of old. Not so long ago it was a club that always aimed to try to qualify for UEFA competitions via the league and maybe even upset those pushing for Champions League qualification

At one point it seemed like the main candidate to break up the teams once referred to as a “big four”—Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United—now considered a “big six” with the addition of Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City.

Given Newcastle United’s high-profile extra investment following their takeover by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, and the slightly more under-the-radar riches at Aston Villa, which is backed by billionaires Nassef Sawiris and Wesley Edens, the number of “big” teams in the Premier League is now more blurry.

Giving it a number now seems outdated as well as inaccurate.

Add the clubs who are well-run on the still significant Premier League budget, such as Brighton and Brentford, and plenty is going on in the middle of the Premier League as well as at the top.

Given the money spent by Everton, which only a year ago put it among the top five in the league for transfer spend in the previous five years, it should still be challenging in those upper echelons of the table, rather than down at the bottom.

But due to the mismanagement at the ownership and executive level, the club has not seen a return on its investments on the field.

It has missed out on this current era where extra European places are now available to Premier League teams, and the league has a thriving middle class.

These upper mid-table teams are now competing in, and in West Ham's case, winning, the UEFA tournaments Everton once aimed to qualify for.

West Ham United footballers on an open-top bus take part in a UEFA Europa Conference League victory ... [+] parade through crowded streets close to the club's former Boleyn Ground stadium in Upton Park on 8 June 2023 in London, United Kingdom. West Ham defeated ACF Fiorentina in the UEFA Europa Conference League Final on 7 June, winning their first major trophy since 1980. (photo by Mark Kerrison/In Pictures via Getty Images)

Everton’s actions in recent years come across more as a case of incompetence rather than a blatant attempt to cheat or break profit and sustainability rules.

This is reflected in the independent commission's sanctions which state: “The cause of Everton’s PSR difficulties was the fact that it overspent (largely on its purchase of new players and its inability to sell other players), and because it finished lower in the league than it had projected in financial year 2022 (16th against the projected 6th – causing a loss of expected income of c.£21 million).”

Everton added in its statement that it will “monitor with great interest the decisions made in any other cases concerning the Premier League's Profit and Sustainability Rules.”

This will no doubt be referring to the ongoing investigations of Manchester City and Chelsea, and given the nature and extent of the alleged charges against those two clubs, an even harsher penalty might be expected for them.

The points deduction sanction against Everton has set a precedent, and the result of the upcoming appeal will also be eagerly awaited by other clubs as well as Everton.

Everton supporters already knew their club was being run poorly. The commission's findings merely confirm it, but the sanction seems overly harsh.

It is those fans who will be left to endure the negative effects of such inept ownership.

Fans of Burnley and Leicester, whose teams were narrowly relegated in 2022 and 2023 respectively when Everton was in the relegation battle with them, may say they are the ones who have suffered on the back of Everton’s rule-breaking.

However, it seems the more money Everton come across, the more problems they see. Spending seemed to make Everton worse on the field, and this more self-sufficient version of the team under Dyche has actually seen the club perform better than it has in years.

There is a glimmer of hope for fans that it is this version of Everton, and not the one of recent seasons past, which will now fight against relegation all over again with a 10-point handicap.