David Moyes: Coaching Analysis

When Everton needed rescuing in January 2025, they did not hire a philosophy. They hired David Moyes, and within a fortnight the team had beaten Tottenham 3-2 and begun a ten-match unbeaten run that turned a relegation fight into a comfortable 13th-place finish.

That is the Moyes offer, and it has barely changed in nearly three decades of management: organisation you can see within weeks, a team that is hard to beat, and attacking play built on getting your best players the ball in dangerous areas as quickly as possible.

For a coach educator he is a study in something unfashionable and valuable: pragmatism as a coherent method, not an absence of one. He enters 2026-27 with a full pre-season behind him, a rebuilt attacking unit and a young squad settling into a new stadium.

The road here

Moyes has managed over a thousand professional matches, and the arc of his career is remarkable. He started at Preston North End in 1998, and his work there earned him the Everton job in 2002.

His first Goodison spell lasted 11 years. On modest budgets he made Everton a fixture in the top half, finishing fourth in 2004-05, a season that won him the LMA Manager of the Year award, and reaching the 2009 FA Cup final. When he left in 2013 it was for Manchester United, a move that lasted less than a season and cost him a decade of reputation.

The rebuild was slow: a spell at Real Sociedad, a difficult year at Sunderland, then two spells at West Ham. The second was the vindication. He took West Ham into Europe repeatedly and won the Europa Conference League in 2023, the club's first major trophy in over 40 years.

Everton re-appointed him on 11 January 2025, eleven years after he left, with the club in the bottom four. He steadied them immediately and secured safety with games to spare, finishing 13th on 48 points.

The 2025-26 season, Everton's first at the Hill Dickinson Stadium, began superbly: a 2-0 win over Brighton in the stadium's first competitive match, seven points from the opening four games, and a spell in sixth. Form levelled out and Everton finished 13th again, on 49 points with 47 goals scored, having flirted with the European places for much of the campaign.

How his teams play with the ball

Moyes builds forward, not sideways. Everton's build-up in 2025-26 was among the quickest in the Premier League, averaging around 127 short passes per game against 38 long balls. The intent is unmistakable: fewer touches in your own half, more touches for your best players in the final third.

This is a principle, not a punt. A long ball to a striker with a rehearsed second-ball structure around him is a pattern, and Moyes drills the pattern. Midfielders position themselves for knockdowns before the ball is kicked, and wide players attack the space behind pushed-on full-backs the moment the first duel is won.

The arrival of Jack Grealish and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall reshaped the attack. Everton became a left-leaning side, playing 42 per cent of their attacks down the left against 36 down the right, with Grealish drawing defenders towards the touchline and Dewsbury-Hall running beyond him. Iliman Ndiaye moved to the right to balance the unit.

The wide game is the creative engine. Moyes wants the ball moved to the flanks early, one-on-ones and overlaps created, and deliveries into the box arriving before the opponent's block is set. Switches of play from deep are a favourite tool for finding the far-side winger in space.

What his teams do not do is take risks in their own third for aesthetic reasons. If the press is on, the ball goes forward, and the team plays for the second ball.

How his teams play without the ball

The foundation is a 4-2-3-1 that defends in a disciplined mid or low block. Two banks stay compact, the double pivot screens the centre, and opponents are shown into wide areas where Everton defend the cross with numbers in the box.

Moyes is not a high-press coach. His sides press selectively, usually when the ball travels backwards or a touch gets heavy, and otherwise conserve their shape and their legs. The bet is that a well-drilled block concedes fewer big chances than an ambitious press that gets broken.

Personnel choices serve the structure. Playing Jake O'Brien, a 6ft 6in centre-back, at right-back for much of 2025-26 was a classic Moyes decision: sacrifice a little attacking fluency for aerial dominance and defensive security on one side, and let the left side carry the creative load.

The honest critique is game management. Everton's 2025-26 was dented by a habit of protecting narrow leads rather than killing games, with cautious use of the bench in matches that finished level or were lost by a single goal. Moyes's block wins you points; sitting in it too early gives some of them back.

The players he picks

Moyes picks for reliability first. Every successful Moyes team has a spine of physically robust, mentally durable players who deliver the same performance every week, and the current Everton squad is built the same way.

Around that spine he adds craft, and he manages it well. Grealish arrived needing rhythm and a defined role and got both: touchline width, licence to draw fouls and defenders, and a team shaped to run beyond him. Dewsbury-Hall brought the box-to-box energy Moyes has always demanded from at least one midfielder.

James Garner is the flexible glue, capable of playing in the pivot or at full-back, and was voted the club's Player of the Season for 2025-26. Ndiaye accepted a positional switch for the balance of the team, which tells you plenty about the dressing room culture.

The common thread is trust. Moyes gives players clear, limited jobs, and he picks the ones who do those jobs without needing to be reminded.

On the training ground

Moyes's training priorities show up in how quickly his teams change. Everton were bottom four when he arrived in January 2025 and unbeaten within weeks, which is only possible when a coach installs a simple defensive structure fast and repeats it daily until it holds under pressure.

Shape work is the constant: the block, the distances between units, the picture for when to step and when to sit. On top of it he layers the attacking patterns, second-ball structures, wide combinations and deliveries, that turn direct play from hopeful to repeatable.

The other verifiable strength is confidence management. Twice now he has taken over a frightened Everton squad mid-season and made them competitive almost immediately, largely by giving players jobs they can succeed at from day one.

For a grassroots coach, that ordering is the lesson: defensive clarity first, because it produces results, and results produce the belief you need to coach everything else.

What you can steal for your team

Moyes is arguably the most transferable elite coach in the Premier League, because his method assumes limited resources rather than elite ones.

Start where he starts: a block that does not break. Our guide to defending in a low block covers the distances, roles and triggers, and the managing game states guide will help you avoid the Moyes trap of protecting a lead ten minutes too early.

Then make direct play a pattern, not a clearance. Decide where the long ball goes, who competes and who collects, and train the second-ball shape until it is automatic. Pair it with early switches to the far side: our guide to switching play shows the mechanics, and the Switch and Deliver from Deep drill turns it into a session.

Everton's left-side overloads are also worth copying. One winger who holds width and one runner beyond him will unbalance most amateur defences: our guides to coaching wingers and coaching full-backs cover both roles, and the Building into the Channel for Box Crossing drill trains the finish of the move.

Above all, steal the ordering: organisation first, confidence second, style third. For complete session plans that follow that logic, join Coach Notes Pro.