Sean Dyche’s rebuild stalls as broken Everton remain locked in limbo

T hree weeks on from Everton’s latest relegation escape and the focus is on how long Bill Kenwright will remain chairman of a board with a population of one. Him. Sean Dyche would be forgiven for asking if anyone at the club was listening when he delivered that blunt, honest and overdue appraisal of Everton’s predicament in the aftermath of Premier League survival.

“There is massive amounts of work to be done, not just from me but from everyone at the club,” the Everton manager said after securing the club’s top-flight status for a 70th successive season with victory over Bournemouth. Other managerial messages from that fraught day included: “There is loads to change here;” and: “It’s a big club but we are not performing like a big club. We have to find a way of changing that. This is two seasons now.”

The response so far has merely reinforced the dysfunctional state that Everton find themselves in under Farhad Moshiri and Kenwright, and offers little encouragement to Dyche.

There have been changes. The departures of Denise Barrett-Baxendale as chief executive, Grant Ingles as chief finance officer and the club legend Graeme Sharp as a nonexecutive director were finally confirmed on Monday, 15 days after Premier League survival was secured. There will be more changes.

Kenwright will exit and interim boardroom appointments will be made in due course, only not within the 48-hour deadline that Everton unnecessarily set on Monday and unsurprisingly failed to meet by Wednesday. MSP Sports Capital, the New York-based investment company, remains on course to purchase its first stake in the club and appoint its own directors. Andy Bell and George Downing, successful local businessmen and Evertonians, are in the frame for