There are countless soccer domestic leagues being played all around the world and some of them rank higher than others, especially if it belongs to Europe. Yes, you guessed it right, we are talking about Championship league and how some of the best teams fight to get a qualification in this UEFA mentored annual event. When we talk about CL, English Premier League comes to our mind, and why not, after all every team tries over here to end at least among the top four to secure a place in the European event, and this year too, this fight continues. Current league table qualifies Chelsea, Manchester City, Arsenal, and Liverpool for the next year’s UEFA event, but one team who is continuously competing for the fourth spot is Everton who has long been predicting to end their campaign residing among the top four. In fact, club chairman Bill Kenwright brought Roberto Martinez with similar expectations that this Spaniard would take them to the Europe. But now, it looks like a daunting task since there are not too many matches are left and other teams are also in commendable form. The highly optimistic chairman even revealed that Martinez had promised him during interview that he would take us into the Champions League.
Initially, everyone felt, it was not more than an exaggerated statement from a newly appointed manager but later when Everton performance was much improved than their last spell, fans started looking them playing in the European tourney, and now they are again out of the top four, but significantly, they lost just one of their last seventeen league games making them one of the strongest contenders this season. Martinez talked about his initial promises and said, “At the press conference, it was a little bit too early to say we would be challenging because I hadn’t even told my players about the vision.
“So it was a little bit: ‘I don’t know how the players are going to react to this!’ It would have helped if he’d allowed me to say it to the players first! I expected to be the one to slowly unfold the plans, not just give it on the first day. My worry was how the group would react.”
If we look at Everton spell this year, they were once a confirmed CL participant, especially when they edged over Manchester United for the first time since 1992 in early December. Martinez further added, “You always have to be driven by a vision at Everton. There are no excuses in football and you have to have that drive. The chairman has reminded me about it as the season has gone on because at the beginning he didn’t believe it was possible.
“So I think it was three or four months into the season and he was starting to believe. “It was the week we beat Manchester United and played so well at the Emirates. Then he said: ‘Maybe I can see what you were saying.”