Everton boss hopes to move step closer to ending 20-year cup drought against Middlesbrough

Roberto Martinez is hopeful of moving a step closer to ending Everton's 20-year cup drought

THE last Everton manager to face Middlesbrough on Teesside in a cup quarter-final lost his job two days later.

 

Roberto Martinez will not suffer the same fate as that which befell Walter Smith back in 2002 should the hosts prevail once again, but he knows his popularity will take a bashing if disappointment ensues.

Everton can tonight move a step closer to ending a trophy drought that goes back two decades to 1995 - the year Martinez first arrived in English football at Wigan Athletic - and the weight of expectation is building.

“We know this game is a big football event because we haven’t been in this situation for a long, long, long time,” said Martinez.

“We are not looking at trying to win a title at this stage, it is about trying to progress into the semi-final. It is an important moment...but in a healthy way.

“As a player you want to be involved in those games.”

 

It is only Everton’s second appearance in the last eight of the competition since 1988 – they reached the semi-finals in 2008 before losing to Chelsea – and Middlesbrough will provide stern opposition having accounted for Manchester United on penalties in the last round.

Martinez is partly to blame for Everton’s anxieties having ironically made their last appearance in the quarter-final of a cup competition an experience to forget. His Wigan team rode roughshod over Everton, scoring three goals in three minutes, en route to winning the FA Cup in 2013.

Yet Ross Barkley revealed last week that the Everton manager has been stressing the importance of winning silverware this season.

This is partly to validate Martinez’s work, and reward a vibrant squad, but there is also the reality that without tangible success those young players at his disposal will be more likely to move on next summer.

 “We want to achieve because we have an exciting group of players,” said Martinez. “The balance is magnificent. We have players in the best moment of their careers. They know what it means to play for Everton and what it represents being successful for Everton.

 

Middlesbrough knocked Manchester United out of the competition in the last round

“Then you have a young group of players who in my eyes are as good as anything in Europe. That doesn’t mean it does not need work or development but we want to achieve, not for any reason other than to make our fans proud and feel we have achieved something.

“As a club we have an incredible history and heritage and now it is time to enjoy a team that is dynamic, brave and that is young.

“We do not want to hide from the responsibility of representing a club like ours but we want to perform and win, but you need to know how to win and at the moment we are in that process.”

Everton have made hard work of their progress so far. They needed extra-time to overcome Barnsley, having trailed 2-0, came from behind to beat Reading and needed penalties to see-off Norwich in the last round.

Joel Robles, the hero of that shoot-out success, will replace Tim Howard in goal and Martinez will give fitness tests to James McCarthy and Gareth Barry.