Recently by Ben Thornley

DAVID MOYES leapt to the defence of Joleon Lescott after the centre back came under fire following Saturday's 3-0 defeat to Portsmouth.

The well-publicised shortcomings in Everton's squad have forced the manager to field Phil Jagielka as a makeshift holding midfielder this campaign, breaking up the former Sheffield United man's successful partnership with Joseph Yobo.

Worryingly, Lescott has yet to replicate the form which saw him pick up successive club Player of the Year awards since his switch back into the centre from the left-back slot and the England international was again out of sorts on Saturday.

Many pointed the finger at the £6m signing for Jermain Defoe's opening goal, when the striker weaved his way unchallenged through Everton's box with Lescott in close attendance.

TO adapt the immortal line delivered by Marcellus in one of Shakespeare's greatest plays: Something is rotten in the state of Goodison Park.

While it would be overly dramatic in the extreme to say Everton are heading for the kind of tragic, desperate fate that befell Hamlet, alarm bells should be ringing loudly following David Moyes' declaration that "we are not ready to win Premier League games yet."

Three games into a new campaign that promised so much three months ago but now threatens to deliver so little, one cannot help but ask two questions: a) Why does the manager feel compelled to make such a statement? and b) How has it come to this?

In normal circumstances, opening up the season with a win and two defeats could be put down to rustiness, and comfort would be taken from the knowledge that things would be quickly rectified once the team found its equilibrium.

DAVID MOYES fears Everton's season could get worse before it improves.

A Jermain Defoe-inspired Portsmouth inflicted a second successive home defeat on Moyes's patchwork side on Saturday to leave the Goodison outfit sat hovering above the bottom three of the Premier League.

The 3-0 defeat further exposed Everton's shortcomings, which Moyes will frantically be trying to address while the transfer window remains open until today's midnight deadline.

Injuries and a failure to recruit the 'six or seven' players identified by the Scot at the start of the summer forced the manager to again pair centre-back Phil Jagielka and 17-year-old Jack Rodwell in the heart of midfield.

And while signings have now begun to arrive at Goodison, Moyes believes it will be some time before he can mould his new-look squad into a cohesive unit ahead of a decisive month for Everton's ambitions.