Everton: one reflex movement, two career directions

Ed Bottomley

The excruciating thing is that they both did exactly the same strange neck dance. Their actions before were different, the games themselves were utterly different, but the spasmodic neck move was the same. In both cases it was a dance borne from emotion shaved to the bone, they both looked like fish, slapping about on the deck, writhing for oxygen.

For a split second Michael Thomas and Victor Anichebe share the same space, and then go their separate ways.

Watching Michael Thomas's goal is always amazing. Real football has the ability to make Roy of the Rovers a dirge. Thomas won Arsenal the league in the dying embers of the last game of the season. Against their title rivals. At Anfield. After the ridiculous last-ditch goal, Thomas rolls off in ecstasy, a man in a barrel about to jump into a Niagara Falls of emotion. Thomas flits between circus cartwheels, and the mad uncontrollable palsy of freebased happiness. Towards the end of his Anfield petite mort he propels himself into the air seemingly using his neck alone, a mad move completely anaesthetised by his joy.

The evil twin of the Michael Thomas' wonder goal is Vic Anichebe's injury. The backdrop itself couldn't be more different. It is St James' Park in February, half time is looming. Slow "to me, to you" exchanges by midfield Sunday drivers are punctured by Vic Anichebe tracking back, winning the ball, and dribbling forward. Kevin Nolan leaps feet first on Vic's right shin, and the youngster writhes in pain, reprising Thomas's neck spasm from 20 years earlier, this time not through joy, but pain. Vic pulls his entire body up with his neck like a huge twisted girder. Physio Mick Rathbone says the sheer size of Anichebe's legs is what stopped the tackle from destroying his career, later the Nigerian describes it as the most painful experience of his life. Kevin Nolan is dismissed and apologises at half time.

The game is smeared with violence, we clash like police and thieves. Ameobi rams Tim Howard and the ball into the net, Rodwell is bullied and buffeted, and Anichebe is crippled. Our Spanish laureate Arteta is injured too, although not from blunt tackling, just from an awkward fall.

Neither Anichebe or Arteta have played since.

Anichebe was proving as awkward for Moyes to handle off the pitch as he is for defenders on it - and Arteta is the bigger loss - but the youngster has been forgotten by many. His name has bobbed up again with news that a pin that was removed from his knee has exposed a bone growth.

Michael Thomas took the ball on a crazed bumpy joy ride all the way to the back of the net, Anichebe's career has been in deep freeze ever since Kevin Nolan's studs hit his shin. For a second though, they are removed from their context in the same neck propelled somersault, agony and ecstasy brought together.

(If you want to look at Nolan's nasty tackle click here - http://www.livefootball.net/2009/02/24/no-excuse-for-nolan-or-the-rules-video-available/ - but if you feel more in the mood for happiness click here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQmO3S2eLPE&feature=player_embedded#)

Everton's whole season has been taken out of context too. Unbelievably, despite our injuries and our pot-less transfer funds, some fans still let out a constant stream of Kenwright kvetches and Moyes moans. Only when Phil Neville, Mikel Arteta, Phil Jagielka, and Steven Pienaar return will we begin to push on. This is a tough time for impatient Evertonians, and knees are jerking.

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