NIGEL MARTYN: No danger of Everton taking foor off gas

What's more, there will be no slacking this weekend as we have a terrific game in prospect against Aston Villa and many will see this as the game that decides who will finish fifth.

The incentive for us to win in Birmingham is massive; they have endured a nightmare run of results over the past month and the prospect of them overhauling Arsenal to finish fourth is looking remote.

If we happen to win at Villa Park, it could well demoralise Martin O'Neill's men, who will already be reeling after a back-to-back defeats against Liverpool and Manchester United but it is not going to be as easy as some people will think.

Villa showed signs of getting back to their best at Old Trafford on Sunday and they have a lot of good players capable of having an influence games - John Carew, for starters, appears to be a striker who fancies it more in some games than he does others.

We will have to be on guard if Villa start pumping high balls into our area and they will see this as an opportunity to kick-start things for the final push to the line.

However, if we needed any extra motivation for going there to put on a show, all we need to do is look at them - they put everything they had into getting through to the UEFA Cup via the Intertoto Cup and there is no doubt their squad is paying the price of an early start.

To avoid the same thing happening to us this time next year, we can't afford to take it easy - nor will we.

No need for Everton rush through Jo deal

TALK is beginning to gather pace about the possibility of Jo signing permanently for Everton next summer.

Weight was added to his argument on Sunday when he scored two goals against Wigan Athletic and his goals to game ratio of five in seven makes impressive reading.

However, it may be best to sound a word of warning at this point - though he has been good in some games, he hasn't pulled up trees in others and David Moyes will have taken note of that.

The manager plays the loan market well - in the past he has brought Tim Howard, Mikel Arteta and Steven Pienaar in on a temporary basis - and getting Jo in January was an excellent decision.

But I'm sure David won't rush in to doing a permanent deal, all the more so if Manchester City demand big money.

What is likely to happen is that he will wait and see who else becomes available in the summer - or see if Jo can convince him before that.