Sunday’s first game under new owners The Friedkin Group saw Sean Dyche’s side produce a batting performance to frustrate the west Londoners.
The Blues sit 15th in the Premier League table heading into Christmas after holding two of this season’s top three sides in their consecutive games.
**Here were the key talking points from Goodison Park:**
New era brings Blues back
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Evertonians could not have asked for a more perfect 72 hours than this.
After years of torment and even humiliation, Christmas came early for long-suffering supporters with confirmation of The Friedkin Group’s takeover.
That was followed by their new owners formally being handed the keys to Bramley-Moore Dock before a high-flying Chelsea’s visit to Goodison Park.
A change in hierarchy should not carry such a transformative effect as it did, but Farhad Moshiri’s tenure has done untold damage to this grand old club.
Finally free from the British-Iranian billionaire’s eight years of chaos, the Grand Old Lady returned at close to its best; baring its teeth from the outset.
The Gwladys Street End even found time for a second-half rendition of ‘On the Banks of the Royal Blue Mersey’ in a nod to their impressive future home.
It was well past due but this felt like the first step in reviving Everton’s soul.
Dyche is finally making a case
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For a second weekend running, Everton held off another high-flying London opponent which already has grand designs on the Premier League title.
While last Saturday’s stalemate at Arsenal was a pure backs to the walls job, Chelsea encountered Sean Dyche’s side in a far more combative mood.
A fifth clean sheet from the past six matches that extended their visitors’ winless record to eight from 11 visits to Goodison also offers food for thought.
Dyche will doubtless be aware he is on borrowed time as the Friedkins weigh up all options before his contract expires at the end of the current campaign.
The Blues’ manager has taken his fair share of criticism since presiding over a start which saw his charges ship 13 goals in their opening four outings.
But for all his well-documented coaching flaws, Dyche would argue that there are few better equipped for a period of stabilisation heading into next season.
Convincing the Goodison faithful, let alone their new custodians, that he has done enough to earn a stay beyond the summer will be his biggest challenge.
So far, so good in ‘tricky’ run
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On paper, Everton’s December run threatened to be a daunting prospect.
A list of fixtures containing the league’s legacy ‘big four’ clubs in Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal and Chelsea was not one for the faint-hearted.
Their Old Trafford drubbing notwithstanding, however, Dyche’s side have continued to come through this theoretically testing period largely unscathed.
Granted, Storm Darragh provided them a reprieve from coming up against an imperious Liverpool in what was set to be the final-ever Goodison derby.
Yet the showing against Enzo Maresca’s title hopefuls in equally windswept and rain-lashed conditions suggests those fears may have been unfounded.
Even a Boxing Day trip to Manchester City, similarly, appears less ominous than previously with the fallen champions continuing their alarming malaise.
Losing at the Etihad Stadium risks putting a different slant on this run, as would ending the year in tasting defeat to a resurgent Nottingham Forest.
For now, though, it’s a case of so far so good.