Marcel Brands has opened up on how Everton's recruitment and scouting strategy was forced to change during the coronavirus pandemic.
The club's director of football has also addressed the club's progression on the pitch so far throughout 2020/21 and the work that still needs to be done in that sense in the future.
The Dutchman was speaking at Everton's hugely popular USA Live event on Saturday evening which has connected supporters from around North America and beyond.
Answering questions directly put to him by some of those fans, Brands addressed how life at Everton in terms of scouting had been quickly forced to change due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The director of football responded: “In the beginning you had no clue how long it would take.
“We changed, immediately, our structure and our direction. We did a lot of games on video.
“But ok it’s different. What we mainly missed was the youth games - let’s say the younger boys in youth tournaments, they were not there and that’s a big thing.
“But we have to deal with it as it was, and as it is. Yeah it’s absolutely not the best way and hopefully next season we can do our normal work again.”
Everton's last match ended in disappointment after a 2-2 draw with Spurs at Goodison Park, despite the hosts having multiple chances to take all three points.
The same could be said about the previous home game against Crystal Palace, where multiple missed opportunities meant that Carlo Ancelotti's side had to settle for a draw.
Brands has opened up on a post-match report that he compiled after that match against the Eagles and addressed the fact that he still believes the Blues have shown improvements this term.
He added: “Yeah I think we’ve improved in consideration to last season.
“I think there’s still a lot of work to do. I think we dropped too many points this season against the teams we should win against.
“After the Crystal Palace game, I always make a post-match report, and one of the things in that report was that - at that moment - against the top seven we had delivered 15 points.
“Out of 12 games against Fulham, Newcastle, Burnley, Southampton, Crystal Palace and Leeds - we had only 14 points.
“That means we dropped 22 points against those six opponents. That should be better and, if that was better, then you could easily be there in the top five.”
Injuries have played their part in recent Everton results, with a number of key players missing matches over the last few weeks.
It's an issue that has been common in football over the course of what has been a strange season, and Brands believes that perhaps only Manchester City in the Premier League have an optimal squad in that sense.
“Yeah absolutely, it started already with a strange and short pre-season - then the start of the competition and immediately an international break. A lot of games," Brands remarked.
“You see a lot of clubs, not only in the Premier League but all over Europe, with a lot of injuries - and we struggled also in the last weeks particularly with that.
“Hopefully, next week, we will have seven or eight of our injured players back in the squad so that’s going in the right direction.
"I think maybe [Man] City have a squad with every position doubled almost with the same quality.
“For every other team, it’s difficult to get that done. Always when you have one or two injuries it’s normal, but if you have seven or eight like last week when we played Brighton - then it will be difficult to keep the same level.
“But ok we have to deal with it. And also it gives us a possibility to put some young players a little bit more forward.”
