Why is Lampard struggling at Everton? His Chelsea record may provide the answer

FT Desk

• 9 Apr 2022 12:19 BST
• 5 min read

There’s no doubt that Frank Lampard’s time in charge of Everton has been nothing short of a disaster.

Since taking over the Merseyside club, the former Chelsea star has managed just four wins and eight defeats from 12 games.

As such, ahead of Saturday’s clash with Manchester United, Everton found themselves staring relegation in the eye as they sat uncomfortably in seventeenth place, just one point above the drop.

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Everton fans would now, with the gift of hindsight, accept that bringing in the inexperienced manager was perhaps the wrong decision from the club.

However, despite the fan fare at the time of his appointment, there were already clear signs from Lampard’s former job in charge of Chelsea that he wasn’t the man to take Everton back up the league table.

Lampard’s record at Chelsea

While Lampard was of course in charge of Derby County before he made the move to Chelsea, Everton fans are only interested in his record in the Premier League. So that’s what we’ll focus on.

Over the course of 57 league games in charge of Chelsea, Lampard’s side won 28, drew 11 and lost 18. That gives him a points-per-game ratio of 1.67.

If that’s roughly what he wanted to emulate at Everton, it would suggest the Merseyside club would have expected a points tally of around 63 points, which would put the club in contention for European spots in most seasons.

However, there’s a reason Chelsea cut Lampard short and brought in Thomas Tuchel instead. The manager’s average of 1.67 was well below what was expected at Stamford Bridge, which is evident from the fact that Tuchel now averages 2.15 per league game with largely the same squad.

While Lampard’s points return at Chelsea may be just what Everton wanted, Tuchel has since proved that the English manager didn’t get anywhere near the best out of the players he had to hand. And, as such, could explain why the young manager and his team have underperformed at Everton as he did at Stamford Bridge.