Everton ran out 1-0 winners over Manchester United at Old Trafford despite playing with 10 men for 77 minutes of the match
Jordan Pickford earned his first career win at Old Trafford
Jordan Pickford earned his first career win at Old Trafford(Image: CameraSport via Getty Images)
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Jordan Pickford revealed that David Moyes had told his players that Everton needed to win at Manchester United to be considered “a proper team.” And the goalkeeper insisted the Blues had moved on from Idrissa Gueye’s sending off for slapping team-mate Michael Keane following their 1-0 victory at Old Trafford.
Pickford said: “It’s a great win, great performance. Some good football as well, but suffering at times as a team. If you’re suffering the right way, you get results.
“The manager said before the game, 'you want to be a proper team, you want to push up the table, tonight's the time to go and stamp your authority on it and get a result'.
“We know it's not as easy as that, but we gave what the gaffer wanted and we got our rewards.
“Football’s weird because Man United are in form at the minute. If they had won tonight they would have been top four or something and everyone's talking about Man United.
“We have to look at ourselves and we've got to put our performance on and not focus on how well Man United are doing because once we put our performance in and our shift we can get results.
“He was really happy, I think the way we've trained this week, I think he's wanted this quite hard and we've got that result but it's just another game. It’s a big result but now we move on to Saturday, we've got a busy period coming up and it's a team effort now and we're called upon to be ready and keep getting results and get momentum.”
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall's spectacular 29th-minute strike proved the match-winner but Pickford was kept busy after that, particularly in the second half. He said: "Yeah, Kiernan has definitely got it on his left! But no, he gets in the right positions, creates threats and if you don't shoot you don't score, so he's put his right foot on it and great goal and great result.
“I just felt it in the moment, felt good all game and nice to get a clean sheet here. (With the) lads digging in, Thierno Barry dropping in, subs coming on, it was a full team performance and that's what it's about and that's the Everton way.
Elaborating on his display, he added: “Yeah, you've just got to do it. That's what we get paid for, that's our job. If I've got to make saves I'm really happy to do that, that's what I'm there for, that's what I work hard for every day and that's what the lads do in front of us.
“I've said we've got the back four, we've got myself, but you've got everyone else digging in, putting blocks in, challenges, clearing and suffering, getting up the pitch, resetting and a lot of hard effort went into tonight to get a result.
“There were going to be changes. It's about suffering as a team, being in the right areas. You've got Ili (Ndiaye) coming back post clearing away.
“You’ve got Jack (Grealish), they're doing the hard yards. They're doing the dirty work to get us a result, because we know the back four are going to put the shift in and you've got the lads doing that, you've got Barry sitting in, you've got the lads coming on. That's a proper performance when you've got to suffer as 10 men.”
Pickford was the player who got between Gueye and Keane during their scuffle that saw the former player sent off. Asked what went on, he replied: “Initially I didn't see what happened. I just saw them arguing. But the main thing is that Idrissa has come in and apologised - half-time or full-time I can't remember. It doesn't look nice ever, but we move on from it and the main thing is we've got the win.”
When it came to the celebrations at the end, Pickford added: “It just shows what it means. It's my first victory here.
“It's a tough place to come, it's got a lot of history. I love playing here and results haven't come by in my Everton time here.
“It's nice to get a win. We’ve been on an international break, we've had to wait Monday at the game to prepare and we've got the result.”