‘Club always comes first’ – Silva coy on future after Everton’s loss to Norwich

Everton manager Marco Silva was not willing to discuss his future after a damaging 2-0 defeat to Norwich, but acknowledged the club must always come first.

Goals from Tom Cantwell and Dennis Srbeny secured the Canaries’ first away win of the season and first league victory since mid-September as they hauled themselves off the foot of the table.

But a sixth defeat in nine league matches leaves the Toffees just four points above the relegation zone with a difficult month to come. They have to face Liverpool, Leicester (twice), Chelsea, Manchester United, Arsenal and Manchester City within their next nine matches.

Another damning statistic, highlighted by their approach against Norwich, is that Silva has lost all four of his Premier League home games against teams starting the day bottom of the table.

A number of fans sang “sacked in the morning” at the end of the game and the Portuguese’s position now seems in jeopardy, but he insists he can only focus on trying to fix the malaise on the pitch.

“I think it is not the main thing to talk about the situation. It is not the moment to talk about individual positions,” Silva said.

“We have to look what is best for us as a club and for myself and the players as well – but always the club has to be at the top.

“If you are really disappointed with the afternoon I can imagine they (fans) are as well and they have the reaction to the manager and the players.

“When you lose a match, the first person they look to is the manager. Football is like that.

“The message is I respect what is their feeling, for sure. It is not the first time they felt the way they felt this afternoon.”

Silva was asked whether he would be speaking to majority shareholder Farhad Moshiri, the British-Iranian billionaire who has already sacked Roberto Martinez, Ronald Koeman and Sam Allardyce since taking control in 2016, after the match.

“It is possible. Normally we do that. I cannot say to you 100 per cent sure but (it is) normally something we do,” he added.

The attention on Silva’s future took the focus away from Norwich’s victory, which they had to do very little to achieve.

It was their first league win at Goodison Park since 1993 and ended a goalless run of 10 hours and 20 minutes on the road in the Premier League.

“Great day for us, a fantastic away performance,” boss Daniel Farke said.

“A first clean sheet win (of the season). We had a trying period and it is always difficult having a few games in a row without a win.

“When you watch how much quality they can bring on, we were not the favourites but a good all-round team performance and a well deserved win at the end.

“We won’t get carried away as we know we won’t win every game and we’re probably still favourites for position 20, but when we bring this quality into the pitch we have a chance.

“Great compliments to the lads – it was an important day for us.”