Gareth Southgate spotted sat by Everton chief Kevin Thelwell, he’ll be angered by Chelsea incident – BBC journalist
England manager Gareth Southgate was spotted sitting next to Everton director of football Kevin Thelwell in Sunday’s (December 10) clash with Chelsea and a BBC journalist said he will not have been happy by one thing he saw.
Shamoon Hafez was in attendance at Goodison Park and noted that Southgate was in attendance, running the rule over Three Lions internationals involved.
But Hafez said there was one thing that Chelsea winger Cole Palmer did that would not have been looked upon too well by Southgate.
“That was a blatant dive from Cole Palmer, less not dress it up any other way. Tom Daley would have been happy with that etc,” Hafez wrote on the BBC’s live blog coverage of the game.
“England manager Gareth Southgate is here, sitting in the box next to Everton director of football Kevin Thelwell. He won’t have been impressed by the play acting from Cole Palmer a few moments ago.”
Not a good look
Cole Palmer has been one of Chelsea’s best performers this season and will certainly have designs on making it into England’s squad for Euro 2024, and there is no reason why he cannot do that.
Having said that, those kind of theatrics – that rightly did not sit well with the Goodison Park faithful! – are not going to win him any favours with Southgate, who will want to see players performing well and not doing silly things.
Of course, it might be that Southgate was keeping a closer eye on the performance of Jarrad Branthwaite, who has been absolutely superb for the Toffees this season and should absolutely be in contention to break into the senior team.
Whoever he was there to look at, though, no one wants to see the sort of diving and theatrics from Palmer, it is the sort of thing ridiculed by everyone, and Everton fans certainly let him know they were not happy.
In other Everton news, one Sky Sports pundit gushed over Jack Harrison for his performance against Chelsea.