Top six seems a distant hope for Everton FC even at this early stage

The season might be only two game old, but at the moment it's difficult to see them emulating achievements of recent seasons.

In fact, even at this early stage, I would stick my neck out and say that Everton will be battling to finish seventh this time round.

Which could, of course, still be good enough for European qualification, and I have no doubt that they will eventually lift themselves form the depths they are in at the moment.

Joleon Lescott's departure will help with that because David Moyes can now finally treat it as a fresh start as he accepts that he will become a Manchester City player.

And spending the money that will go with that deal will see some new faces coming in and give the existing players a bit of a lift.

Rather than being held back by an ongoing transfer saga, which for my money should have been sorted out weeks ago given the effect it's had, it will feel like there's some progress being made and everyone can finally move on.

Which can only be a good thing. But as confident as I am that Everton can get past this shaky start, recovering to the extent that they maintain their top five status is going to be a big ask.

Maybe even too big an ask for someone with Moyes's record.

There's no getting away from the fact that Tottenham and Manchester City are finally ready to raid the top six and leave Everton and Aston Villa to battle it out behind them.

Spurs are the big worry. They've won their first three games and are already nine points up on Everton. And they haven't even used Roman Pavlyuchenko and Peter Crouch to any great extent.

It shows they have quality and depth in their squad, while Everton's is threadbare. You only have to look a their bench at Burnley in Sunday to realise the massive difference between the squads.

The same is, of course, true of Manchester City. It's inconceivable that they won't be up there challenging and you can already see in their 100% start to the season that they have that extra match-winning quality that only money can buy.

There's not much Everton can do to stop other teams getting stronger but it already shows the massive difference in the landscape of the Premier League compared to the previous two seasons.

I don't anticipate Everton struggling as much as they did at Turf Moor, when they looked a bit devoid of ideas - the return of Mikel Arteta can't come soon enough.

But any improvement they make will still only leave me with the impression that finishing seventh could be the best they can hope for.

Mark Lawrenson was talking to NICK SMITH