Everton FC News: We can break into the top four, Joseph Yobo

Jun 23 2009 by Chris Beesley, Liverpool Daily Post

Everton FC News: EVERTON defender Joseph Yobo has backed the club to break into the top four of the Premier League.

The Nigerian international’s future at Goodison Park had looked in doubt in the latter stages of last season as he edged towards the final year of his contract while struggling to get a regular place in the starting line-up due to the impressive form of Phil Jagielka and Joleon Lescott’s central defensive partnership.

However, after signing a new five-year deal with the club, Yobo, who was manager David Moyes’s first major signing in 2002, is now looking forward to a bright future at Goodison.

The 28-year-old was part of the Everton team that finished fourth in 2005 and after now helping Moyes’s men to consecutive fifth-place finishes, he is again backing his team-mates to secure a Champions League spot – providing that Moyes his given sufficient funds to strengthen his squad.

Yobo said: “With a better financial backing, we can be in the top four before long.

“We have a very bright future ahead.

We have finished these past two seasons within the top six and we are still growing as a team.

“I believe that in the very near future we will break into the top four in England.”

Despite some encouraging form personally, Yobo endured a nightmare second season with Everton as the team came 17th with just 39 points in 2003/04 – just 12 months after finishing seventh.

However, Yobo believes those dark days have now long gone and he was pleased with the way the side soldiered on to pip Aston Villa for fifth spot last term despite suffering long-term injuries to his compatriots Ayegbeni Yakubu and Victor Anichebe plus Mikel Arteta and Jagielka.

He said: “I’m happy I have been a big part of this club that has made such great progress.

“At the beginning for me in England, it was as if I had made a wrong decision to go there, but now we are fighting to be in the top four.

“We lost some big players like Yakubu through injury during the season, but typical Everton, when a player steps out, another player steps into his place.

“We missed them when they were not there and it will be good to have them back in the team.

“But, at the same time, we have coped in their absence.”

Jagielka’s heartbreaking injury suffered just a week after he’d scored the winning penalty at Wembley in the semi-final shoot-out victory over Manchester United handed Yobo with the chance to play in the FA Cup Final but the fact he failed to break his trophy duck with the club still rankles him.

Everton took the lead after just 25 seconds as Louis Saha netted the fastest goal in FA Cup Final history but Yobo and his team-mates were unable to hold on as Chelsea hit back to triumph 2-1.

Yobo said: “It was very disappointing we did not win the Cup.

“This was probably our biggest game in a while and we had the chance to make history.

“We prepared so well but at the end of the day, we did not make it.

“We went ahead in the final and a typical Everton team would have held on to this goal and won the Cup.

“But credit to Chelsea, they fought back to win the game.

“We now have to move on and look to a very bright future.”

Meanwhile, Everton chief executive Robert Elstone insists that the club are working hard behind the scenes to bring in fresh recruits this summer despite no new faces having arrived yet.

He told evertonTV: “There is an awful lot of work going on.

“We are talking to a number of players and a number of clubs.

“We absolutely recognise the need to strengthen – we are fiercely ambitious and if that is the case then you need to go one step further than fifth place and one step further than appearing in an FA Cup final.

“To do that we know we need to bring talent in and we are not sitting on our hands in any way. “