Everton F.C. participant in 1995 FA Cup Final
Everton Football Club () is an English professional association football club based in Liverpool that competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club was a founder member of the Football League in 1888, and has, as of May 2023, competed in the top division for a record 120 seasons, having missed only four top-flight seasons (1930–31, 1951–52, 1952–53, and 1953–54). Everton is the club with the second-longest continuous presence in English top-flight football, and ranks third in the all-time points rankings. The club has won nine league titles, five FA Cups, one European Cup Winners' Cup and nine Charity Shields.
Formed in 1878, Everton won their first League Championship during the 1890–91 season. After winning four more League championships and two FA Cups, the club experienced a post-Second World War lull until a revival in the 1960s. A period of sustained success came in the mid-1980s, when Everton won a further two League championships, one FA Cup, and the 1985 European Cup Winners' Cup. The club's most recent major trophy was the 1995 FA Cup.
The club's supporters are colloquially known as "Evertonians" or "Blues". Everton's main rivals are Liverpool, whose home stadium at Anfield is just under one mile away from Everton's home at Goodison Park; the two clubs contest the Merseyside derby. Everton have been based at Goodison Park since 1892, having moved from their original home at Anfield following a disagreement over its rent. The club's home colours are royal blue shirts with white shorts and socks.Everton was a founding member of the Premier League in 1992, but struggled to find the right manager. Howard Kendall had returned in 1990, but could not repeat his previous success. His successor, Mike Walker, was statistically the least successful Everton manager to date. When former Everton player Joe Royle took over in 1994, the club's form started to improve; his first game in charge was a 2–0 victory over derby rivals Liverpool. Royle dragged Everton clear of relegation and led the club to the FA Cup for the fifth time in its history by defeating Manchester United 1–0 in the final. The cup triumph was also Everton's passport to the Cup Winners' Cup, its first European campaign in the post-Heysel era. Progress under Royle continued in 1995–96 as the team climbed to sixth place in the Premiership. A fifteenth-place finish the following season saw Royle resign towards the end of the campaign, and he was temporarily replaced by club captain Dave Watson.
Howard Kendall was appointed Everton manager for the third time in 1997, but the appointment proved unsuccessful as Everton finished seventeenth in the Premiership. The club only avoided relegation due to its superior goal difference over Bolton Wanderers. Former Rangers manager Walter Smith then took over from Kendall in the summer of 1998, but only managed three successive finishes in the bottom half of the table. The Everton board finally ran out of patience with Smith, and he was sacked in March 2002 after an FA Cup exit at Middlesbrough and with Everton in real danger of relegation. His replacement, David Moyes, guided Everton to a safe finish in fifteenth place.In 2002–03 Everton finished seventh, which was its highest finish since 1996. It was under Moyes' management that Wayne Rooney broke into the first team before being sold to Manchester United for a club record fee of £28 million in the summer of 2004. A fourth-place finish in 2004–05 ensured that Everton qualified for the UEFA Champions League qualifying round. The team failed to make it through to the Champions League group stage and was then eliminated from the UEFA Cup. Everton qualified for the 2007–08 and 2008–09 UEFA Cup competitions, and was the runner-up in the 2009 FA Cup final. During this period, Moyes broke the club record for highest transfer fee paid on four occasions: signing James Beattie for £6 million in January 2005, Andy Johnson for £8.6 million in summer 2006, Yakubu for £11.25 million in summer 2007, and Marouane Fellaini for £15 million in September 2008.At the end of the 2012–13 season, Moyes left his position at Everton to take over at Manchester United, bringing in staff from Everton to join him in July (assistant manager Steve Round, goalkeeping coach Chris Woods and coach Jimmy Lumsden), with Everton players Phil Neville and Marouane Fellaini also leaving for United, the former joining the coaching staff. Moyes was replaced by Roberto Martínez, who led Everton to 5th place in the Premier League in his first season while amassing the club's best points tally in 27 years with 72. The following season, Martínez led Everton to the last 16 of the 2014-15 UEFA Europa League, where it was defeated by Dynamo Kyiv, whilst domestically finishing 11th in the Premier League. Everton reached the semi-finals of both the League Cup and the FA Cup in 2015–16, but was defeated in both. After a poor run of form in the Premier League, Martínez was sacked following the penultimate game of the season, with Everton lying in 12th place.Martínez was replaced in the summer of 2016 by Ronald Koeman, who left Southampton to sign a three-year contract with Everton. In his first season at the club, he qualified for the Europa League, but a poor start to the 2017–18 season left Everton in the relegation zone after nine games, and Koeman was sacked on 23 October following a 5–2 home defeat to Arsenal. Sam Allardyce was appointed Everton manager in November 2017, but he resigned at the end of the season amid fan discontent at his style of play.Marco Silva was named Everton manager in May 2018. In November that year, the club was banned from signing academy football players from its youth clubs for two years. Silva led Everton to finish 8th in his first season in charge, but after a poor start to the following season which left the team in the relegation zone on 14 points, he was sacked on 5 December 2019. His last league match was a 5–2 loss to Liverpool at Anfield. Former player and first-team coach Duncan Ferguson stepped in as caretaker manager for the next three games before his replacement, Carlo Ancelotti; Ferguson stayed as assistant manager.Ancelotti left the club in June 2021 to rejoin former club Real Madrid as manager, having led the club to a 10th place finish in his only full season at the club. Former Liverpool manager Rafael Benítez was appointed as his replacement, subsequently becoming only the second person to manage both Liverpool and Everton. He was dismissed in January 2022 following 9 losses in his last 13 games in charge at the club, and was replaced by former Chelsea boss Frank Lampard. Lampard was later also dismissed in January 2023 after extremely poor performance.
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