Tim Howard has claimed Everton are loaded with confidence but insists nobody is getting carried away ahead of Christmas.
The goalkeeper believes Roberto Martinez has brought about an evolution which has provided unprecedented levels of self-belief at Goodison Park.
Everton beat defending champions Manchester United in midweek before holding current Premier League leaders Arsenal to a draw on Sunday.
Although Howard was delighted with the victory at Highbury, which saw Everton out-pass the Gunners, the American keeper insists nobody is becoming complacent.
“I think it’s the most confident we’ve been,” he told the Liverpool Echo.
“We know when we cross the line that we have a formula to win games. It’s not guesswork – if we do a, b, and c we’ll get d. That’s a good feeling to have.
“We don’t want to get carried away because we’re not even half way through the season but we’re coming into game and we know how to pick teams apart.”
Everton are currently unbeaten in eight top flight matches and Howard believes Martinez’ mould of football is paving the way for further success.
“We’ve only lost one game and we have a way of playing where we can dictate the game and if that carries on like this we can be successful,” he added.
“One of the key things we worked on was doing to Arsenal what they usually do to other teams, and I think that proved a point.
“The stats proved we did it and it says a lot about this team. If we can do all those little things week in, week out we’re only going to grow more in confidence.”
The American Goalie was in fine form once again on Sunday, forming a series of impressive saves to deny Arsenal, but insists much of the plaudits must be shared with his centre-back pairing of Phil Jagielka and Sylain Distin.
“You can be the best goalkeeper in the world but if you’re playing behind a leaky defence you look poor,” he said.
“I’m behind a great unit with Jags and Distin who have been different class.
“Then we have James and Gareth screening us so well. We have a really solid six there.”
Written by Steve Milne – Leave me your thoughts below 🙂
