Ronald Koeman fired by Everton: Why it was time

Ronald Koeman has left Everton, the club announced in a statement on Monday.

Everton currently sits in 18th in the Premier League table, relegation territory, and after this weekend’s embarrassing 5-2 loss to Arsenal, it was clear Koeman’s future with the club was over.

“Everton Football Club can confirm that Ronald Koeman has left the club,” the statement read, in a post to the club’s official Twitter account.

Why is he out?

Everton haven’t been good enough, and it’s unclear why Koeman thought this group of players would ever be good enough. Koeman can’t be blamed for some of his younger stars moving on to bigger clubs — he was never going to keep Romelu Lukaku around, and Barcelona triggered a buyback clause in the contract of Gerard Deulofeu — but the players he brought in simply didn’t have the quality to carry a team. Wayne Rooney is past his peak, and Gylfi Sigurdsson is a fine player. But beyond fit issues, are those two in 2017 really the players you want to build a team around?

That and some other swings and misses — Michael Keane, Davy Klaassen come to mind — doomed the club.

Was this the right move?

Yes. Koeman’s transfer window had a low of eyebrows raised before the season began, and he’s managed to do nothing since then to convince the Everton faithful that he has the capacity to turn it around.

Where was Koeman before Everton?

Koeman has managed all over Europe, with his most recent stints at Southampton and Feyenoord. Before that, he has managed at Ajax, Benfica, PSV, Valencia, and AZ.

It wasn’t all bad, right?

It was pretty bad, and moving forward, it doesn’t look much better. Koeman paid to bring in a lot of players he clearly rated, who clearly do not warrant that rating. The club is now stuck with a depleted roster lacking the quality to compete at the top level. To get back to mid-table, they’ll need a manager who is ready to work with this group, and they’ll need him to pull some magic in the January transfer window.