Everton boss didn't even celebrate moment that summed up £120,000-per-week star's frustrations
Today marks the 33rd birthday for former Everton player Bernard
He is the smallest Everton player of modern times but when Bernard enjoyed his biggest moment in a royal blue jersey, there were no fans inside Goodison Park to enjoy his dramatic winner. And, while those around him celebrated wildly with the match-winner, manager Carlo Ancelotti just calmly blew on his cup of tea.
That was Everton’s 5-4 extra-time victory over Jose Mourinho’s Tottenham Hotspur in an FA Cup fifth-round tie, on February 10, 2021. But as Bernard prepares to blow the candles out on his cake this year, he must hope that his 33rd birthday elicits more of a celebration than we got from the Italian that night, who like the attacking midfielder is now based in Brazil as national team coach.
As pointed out by this correspondent in my book Spirit of the Blues: Everton’s Most Memorable Matches and Goodison Park’s Greatest Games, in normal circumstances, the Grand Old Lady would have been shaking to the rafters when Bernard volleyed in the decisive ninth goal of the night.
However, supporters were kept out due to the global coronavirus pandemic and in some ways, the low-key backdrop to the ding-dong action on the pitch summed up the frustrations of Bernard’s time on Merseyside.
He arrived from Ukrainian side Shakhtar Donetsk in the summer of 2018, a transfer window that also saw compatriot Richarlison snapped up from Watford for an initial £35million, Kurt Zouma brought in on loan from Chelsea, and Everton launching a triple raid on Barcelona for Lucas Digne, Yerry Mina and Andre Gomes.
Although out-of-contract Bernard came on a Bosman-style free transfer, this enabled him to command substantial wages, understood to be in the region of £120,000-a-week.
Despite his silky skills, the diminutive samba star would often struggle to impose himself among the physicality of the English game.
Blues had to wait until March 30 the following year to see Bernard’s first goal for the club as he met a low Seamus Coleman cross to net from close range at the back post and seal a 2-0 win at West Ham United with what proved to be his only Premier League strike of his maiden campaign.
Cutting inside from the left wing and beating Ben Foster with a low, right-foot shot at his near post just 10 minutes into Everton’s first home game of the following season against manager Marco Silva’s previous club Watford to earn a 1-0 success, hinted at better times ahead.
However, despite some intricate footwork in a tight space to open the scoring in a 2-0 victory over West Ham United a couple of months later – a fixture Silva had admitted was a “must win” for him after four straight losses – the manager who shared a native Portuguese tongue with Bernard had been sacked after a 5-2 thrashing to Liverpool at Anfield on December 4 left the Blues in the relegation zone.
With replacement Ancelotti bringing in James Rodriguez, who he had previously worked with at Real Madrid and Bayern Munich, as his main creative force the following season, Bernard mostly found himself on the bench and his winner against Spurs came after coming on as a substitute with 20 minutes remaining of normal time. Indeed, out of the 84 matches he would play in total for Everton in all competitions, scoring eight times, Bernard would only complete 90 minutes on 13 occasions.
Was the South American, who stands at just 164cm (approximately 5ft 4½in), a mere centimetre taller than the Premier League’s shortest player at the time, Bournemouth’s pocket-sized Aberdonian winger Ryan Fraser, just too tiny for English top flight football?
Adrian ‘Inchy’ Heath, who won a brace of League Championships and an FA Cup with Everton, plus Alan Ball, who is widely considered to be the Blues’ most-talented outfield player of the post-war era, were both 5ft 6in and there have been several ‘mighty atoms’ at the club who were even smaller than those two. In the Premier League era, 5ft 5in winger Aaron Lennon made 77 appearances for Everton and scored nine goals.
Goodison’s ‘Little General’ Bobby Collins arrived in September 1958, was just 5ft 4in and took just a dainty size 4 boot. But there was nothing delicate about the Glaswegian’s play and the ‘Pocket Napoleon’ was famed for his ferocious style against much larger opponents, playing 147 games and scoring 48 goals for the Blues.
Deceptively strong, inside left Alex Stevenson stood a mere 5ft 3in but was known as Goodison’s ‘Celtic Sorcerer’ either side of the Second World War, turning out 271 times for Everton, scoring 90 goals and winning the League Championship in 1939.
Mini marvel Alec Troup, a mere 5ft 5in, set up the most momentous goal in Goodison history, floating in the corner kick in 1928 that provided the prolific Dixie Dean with a record 60th league goal of the season.
It was just one of many occasions that the Scot, who played 260 times for Everton between 1923-1930 scoring 35 goals, produced the ammunition for Dean who said: “Out of those 60 goals I scored, I must have scored 40 from centres by Troup.”
‘Goal a game’ Fred Geary was Everton’s first big star at centre-forward in the pioneering Victorian era but unlike later Blues icons in the position, he was hardly a target man given his pint-sized 5ft 2in frame. Quite probably the smallest ever player to turn out in the club’s first team, Geary, who was snapped up from home town club Notts Rangers, netted 86 times for Everton in 98 outings, including 20 in their first title-winning season of 1890/91 before crossing Stanley Park to help Liverpool win the Second Division Championship in 1896, later returning to Goodison as a groundsman.
If Geary was an oddity as a vertically-challenged Everton centre-forward, Johnny Holt, who played centre-half for a decade between 1888-1898, was nicknamed ‘The Little Devil.’
Club stalwart Will Cuff remarked that Holt, who played 252 games for Everton and won a League Championship in 1891, was actually considerably smaller than his official ‘listed’ height of just 5ft 4in.
After post-Everton spells with United Arab Emirates club Sharjah and Greek side Panathinaikos, Bernard is now back in his home city of Belo Horizonte – where he won the last of his 14 caps for Brazil in the infamous 7-1 mauling to Germany in the 2014 World Cup semi-final – for a second spell with Atletico Mineiro, his first top-flight club. Shortly after signing for the Blues in 2018, he outlined the challenges he had faced to succeed in light of his small stature.
Bernard said: “I was released on two occasions at Atletico Miniero. Obviously this caused me some concern but I did get another opportunity and once I started playing, I improved.
“I just had to show my qualities every day in training and in all games, because I knew this would be a problem I would face on a daily basis.
“I have always faced prejudice for my height and physique but it’s never been something that has worried me. I’ve always followed my dad’s advice to overcome the problems of height and physical-related issues I might come across.
“I can use my qualities to compensate for any of these physical issues so it’s not a worry for me. On the pitch, if you are quick with your feet and your mind, these small margins can make a small difference.”
One thing that isn’t short with Bernard though is the list of other former Everton players he shares a birthday with. Also born on September 8 were Gylfi Sigurdsson (1989), who teed him up for that winner against Spurs; Gary Speed (1969); Ray Atteveld (1966); Jackie Grant (1924) and George Wilson (1883).