Interim Everton Women boss says what must happen to turn results around

Chris Roberts didn’t have to think twice about accepting an offer to temporarily take charge of Everton Women this week after Jean-Luc Vasseur was sacked by the club.

And the new interim boss, who started the week as a first team coach, admits that results will need to come before style if the Blues are to reverse their fortunes and climb back up the Women’s Super League.

Vasseur’s exit was announced by the club at past midnight on Wednesday morning after a 95-day spell in charge which resulted in only one win in six league games.

But as Everton prepare to face in-form Reading on Sunday, Roberts is already satisfied with the initial response from his players, even if things have been happening at a rapid pace.

Speaking to the press for the first time today, he said: “I found out late on Tuesday evening. In terms of preparation, obviously there’s a lot of change from what’s been going on in the previous weeks.

“But thankfully, our kind of ‘day one’ is Wednesday, so we weren’t in the middle of a week’s preparation going into the Reading game already.

“Preparation for the game has been as planned as I would like with no other distribution other than the obvious, that we have had a change of management.”

Everton had Champions League qualification aspirations at the start of the season, but a disappointing start sees them currently lying 10th in the WSL with only two teams propping up the division below them.

When asked about the task in front of him, Roberts conceded that a back-to-basics approach was required to kick-start their season.

He said: “The league table certainly doesn’t lie, we’re all aware of that.

“The first thing that I want to do is just to help them to get back to what they have been performing like over