A tribute to Samuel Eto'o

At around half past 4 on Saturday afternoon, a tweet from the official Sampdoria twitter account confirmed the news that Samuel Eto’o had left Everton with a photo of the 3 time European cup winner wearing a Sampdoria shirt. I take a look at the effect Samuel Eto’o had with Everton during his short spell with the club.

Well after weeks of speculation surrounding the future of Samuel Eto’o it was confirmed on Saturday that he had finally completed his move to Sampdoria. But what does this mean for Everton? Well, in all honesty not much. Although he had his moments, his time playing as the lone striker has been restricted due to players such as Naismith, Lukaku and even Kone in recent weeks being the preferred option. The competition for places hasn’t eradicated Eto’o from the starting line up however, instead he’s had to try his hand at new positions on the pitch. Players playing out of position seems to have become a theme with Everton this season with Ross Barkley suffering the most. Throughout the season, Eto’o has played in various area’s of the pitch whether it be on the wing, in the hole behind the striker and on a couple of occasions in a slightly deeper midfield role. Eto’o has had an illustrious career spanning over 15 years where he has played amongst some of the worlds greatest ever players and won countless amounts of trophies.

Source: evertonfc.com

The man is proven goal scorer and needs to play upfront where he thrived from a very early age, so why didn’t he play there for us? Well as I mentioned earlier there has been competition for places and there always is with any big club but just because of his history and reputation it doesn’t mean that he should have been a regular starter. No man is bigger than the club. Eto’o is no good in a midfield role where he picks the ball up and just passes it on, any professional should be able to do that. He needs to play in a position where he specialises and the end of the day that was probably his downfall. It was no fault of his own, it was the managers if anything. I’m a big fan of Roberto but he’s made mistakes this season and that was one of them.

Despite my negativity so far it wasn’t all bad with Eto’o and he certainly had a positive impact in his first few weeks with the club. There was a huge roar of excitement and anticipation at Goodison back in September when a 3 time European Cup winner came on as a second half substitute to make his Everton debut against his previous club Chelsea. Eto’o made an instant impact with a power header of a goal just 6 minutes after coming on to pull the score back to 4-3 in a crazy game of football which in the end Chelsea triumphed 6-3. The former Barcelona forward continued to produce good performances and it wasn’t long before he netted his second goal for the club. He scored Everton’s first away European goal of the season back in the beginning of October with our only goal of the game in a 1-1 draw with Russian side Krasnodar. The 33 year olds next and last 2 goals for us came later that month in a 3-1 win away at Burnley – in one of our only 5 league wins this season. It was a game where Samuel Eto’o completely stole the show with a man of the match performance in a game where he narrowly missed out on becoming Everton’s first hatrick scorer since Louis Saha back in 2010. 2 goals from Eto’o, including an excellent long distance strike 5 minutes from time ensured Everton would take the 3 points back to Goodison.

Samuel Eto’o had a great first couple of months with the club but the amount of attacking options at the club later on in the season meant playing in other positions which simply didn’t suit him. But It’s not just his performances on the pitch that had an impact at the club. Samuel Eto’o is one of the best players of this century and a role model to many people so having him on the list of your former players can surely only enhance the reputation of the club can’t it?

We wish him all the best with his new club, it’s an honour that such a great player has graced the Goodison turf in Everton colours. Thank you and Goodbye Samuel.