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ESPN staff 6y

Ronald Koeman out as Everton manager following poor start to season

Everton have parted company with manager Ronald Koeman following a poor start to the season, the club confirmed in a statement on Monday.

Following Sunday's 5-2 Premier League loss against Arsenal, Everton sit in the bottom three of the table with just eight points from nine games. 

They are also likely to crash out of the Europa League at the group stage after picking up only one point in their opening three games.

The club posted a statement confirming the departure via their Twitter account which read: "Everton Football Club can confirm that Ronald Koeman has left the Club.

"Chairman Bill Kenwright, the Board of Directors and Major Shareholder Farhad Moshiri would all like to express their gratitude to Ronald for the service he has given to the Club over the past 16 months and for guiding the Club to seventh place in last season's Premier League campaign."

Ryan Giggs on Monday expressed his interest in replacing Koeman as well as the vacant Leicester City job, while sources told ESPN FC former England manager Sam Allardyce is among the early candidates in the frame at Everton.

Speaking after the defeat to Arsenal, a fifth in nine Premier League games this season, Koeman said he was still the man to turn Everton's fortunes around.

"The team is underperforming, it is in a difficult situation mentally and struggling for confidence. That is what we need to change," he told a news conference. "I told the players that I believe in the players, I believe in the commitment of the players.

"I still believe I can change the whole situation, but everybody knows how it works in football. That is all I answer about this situation.

"If you start to think negative then maybe there is no solution. I am not like that. All the rumours in the newspapers is normal.

"The final result is really poor, but all these kind of decisions [about the future] are not in my hands.''

Everton spent big over the summer bringing in Jordan Pickford, Michael Keane, Davy Klaassen and Gylfi Sigurdsson, but they lost top scorer Romelu Lukaku to Manchester United.

Lukaku has scored seven goals in his first nine Premier League appearances for United, the same number as the whole of the Everton squad. 

He becomes the third top-flight boss this season to lose their job, following Frank De Boer at Palace and Craig Shakespeare at Leicester.

Information from ESPN FC transfers correspondent Peter O'Rourke was used in this report.

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