moyes is liked by the british press because he was one of the best managers in england for like ten years. not the best or the second best, but one of the best.
which is still really quite good. like talking about him being a midtable manager is interesting in the context of whether he should be manager of a club that wants to be top three in the world. but in the context of whether he's good at his job, he's absolutely the best midtable manager out there. there's a lot of managers in england, people like redknapp, pulis, pardew, allardyce, hodgson etc never were as good as him over that period. if it's so fucking easy just to grind and hoof then why was his everton so much better than the other midtable teams. why can't they repeat what he did consistently over that period.