Hi everyone,

Well I must say I’m in good spirits after what was a wonderful weekend for me.

Everton beat Middlesbrough, then United won and then I got picked for England in the evening.

On the Everton front, we seem to be getting things together. Since we drew with Chelsea I think our form has improved a lot. We’re beginning to look solid again which was the basis of the club’s success last season.

Probably the biggest change has been James Beattie’s return to fitness and the fact that we are now playing 4-4-2.

Also Andy van der Meyde has given us an extra option. He looks a class player. He joined the club on transfer deadline but, because he joined the club with an injury, we’ve had to really put him to the back of our mind.

The frightening thing about him, though, is that there is definitely much more to come. He’s only just got himself fit and is still settling into English football so he’s looking like he’s going to be a tremendous asset for us.

Having him and James Beattie there is a real lift. The manager has asked us to get back to simple football so we’ve been getting plenty of crosses into the box and that’s starting to pay dividends.

And the thing with James Beattie is that, if you provide the ammunition, he has a proven track record of scoring goals and that is what we were missing at the start of the season.

And, now that we are playing with both Duncan and Beatts upfront, I think Duncan is taking a bit of the pressure off James.

The defenders are often drawn towards Duncan because of his aerial threat, which gives Beatts a bit more space and allows him to play as a kind of second striker.

He’s a really bubbly character too so everyone’s happy to see him amongst the goals. We hope that he stays fit too because when he is fit, he almost guarantees you goals.

Throughout everything though the manager has been very consistent. You tend to find that with all great managers; they never tend to change their demeanour or the way that they act with the players. They tend to take a long-term view.

That’s impressive when you consider that it was a pretty wretched run that we had at the start of the season.

I was talking to Simon Davies only the other day and we were discussing how we were starting to take it all a bit personally because last season Everton had done so fantastically and then we came in and we don’t win a game!

But the gaffer has been great. He’s kept working us hard, and kept instilling in us that we are a good team. That perseverance and encouragement has worked a treat.

The manager even took me aside the other week to assure me that even though things weren’t going well at the time, all the things he had said to me when he signed me about the club were still true.

I told him that even in the bad times I was still enjoying every minute and the club. As they say, form is temporary and class is permanent. Hopefully that will be the case because we certainly have the players to turn it around.

Log on again on Tuesday when I’ll be talking about Sunday’s other big game - United v Chelsea…

Phil Neville

England take on Austria on Saturday 08 October. For all the best build-up and match day coverage, stay logged-on to TheFA.com.