Frank Lampard sensationally questioned his Everton players’ courage in the wake of their FA Cup quarter-final thrashing by Crystal Palace and insisted he does not have a “magic wand” to fix their lack of resilience.
The Toffees, who remain embroiled in a relegation dogfight in the Premier League, slumped to a 4-0 loss at Selhurst Park as goals from Marc Guehi, Jean-Philippe Mateta, Wilfried Zaha and Will Hughes ensured they missed out on a trip to Wembley.
The visitors started brightly but collapsed after Andros Townsend was withdrawn with what Lampard described as a “bad” knee injury in the 17th minute, leaving the Everton manager to bemoan a lack of steel among his players in his post-match press conference.
“I don’t have a magic wand to get inside people’s heads and change resilience across the whole squad. That’s a work in progress,” he said.
“The difficult thing for us is that we don’t have lots of time in terms of the league to do that.
“My job title is quite vast as a manager, but to get inside heads and change that with the flick of a switch is not possible.
“As frustrating as it is for me, as frustrating as it is for the 4,000 fans who travelled down and the people watching [at home], that’s one we have to fight against.”
Everton came into the game on the back of a dramatic 1-0 win over Newcastle in the Premier League on Thursday night but Lampard bemoaned his players’ inability to show the same fight on a consistent basis.
He added: “There’s only so much you can keep trying to butter someone up to give them confidence.
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“There’s a balance of confidence and playing at the cut-throat end of football here.
“This is a quarter-final today to get to Wembley and if you haven’t got the confidence to play, you can quickly flip it and say, have you got the b******* to play?
“That’s the football reality. If you fall somewhere in the middle, then don’t worry about it.
“We didn’t play that badly today and Palace didn’t play that well today, but we lost 4-0 because of a lack of confidence and a lack of what I just said.”
Lampard continued: “It wasn’t tactics. Tactics showed in the first 20 minutes. Palace couldn’t get out of their half.
“So, when you do things right within that structure, you’ll be alright.
“But if you can’t be clinical in front of goal, you won’t score goals, you won’t feel like you’re going to score goals.
“And if you allow people to stroll into your box and finish with ease, they will finish with ease. Real basics.”
Vieira dreaming of FA Cup glory
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Crystal Palace boss Patrick Vieira, meanwhile, a five-time FA Cup winner during his playing career, insisted Crystal Palace can upset the odds and go on and claim the trophy.
The Eagles have been drawn against Chelsea in the semi-finals, with Manchester City, 4-1 winners over Southampton, facing the winner of Liverpool’s tie against Nottingham Forest.
“Anything is possible,” said Vieira when asked to assess his chances as an underdog at the semi-final stage.
“They will all want to play Palace, but when you get to that level, anything can happen and that is the beauty of this game.”
He added: “What I really loved about the performance today is how we managed the game. We went through a really difficult period in the first 20 minutes, but we managed to stick together.
“We showed some experience – that hasn’t been our strength this season – and we accepted the fact they were on top of us and we couldn’t play, so we decided to go longer and to wait until we got back into the game. We managed that period really well.”
