Everton’s European football hopes were boosted on Saturday following a 2-1 victory over Fulham.
After a couple of 1-1 draws against Leeds United and Brighton, fans were very keen for a win against Fulham – and David Moyes delivered.
The game followed a similar pattern as in recent weeks. Everton played poorly in the first-half, before there were big improvements in the second 45.
Did anyone else aside from Dewsbury-Hall impress you? 🤔
Fulham v Everton - Premier League
Photo by James Fearn/Getty Images
Everton rode their luck and were luckily still in the game at the break, and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall produced an influential second-half display to help Everton come back to win.
He scored himself after good work by Vitalii Mykolenko, before taking a corner that was turned in by Bernd Leno under pressure from Jake O’Brien.
The win was huge for Everton, who are eighth and in firm contention for European football.
But there was a surprisingly rare element to the win.
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Everton comeback wins away from home have been in short supply
David Moyes managing Everton.
Photo by James Gill – Danehouse/Getty Images
Fans praised Everton’s show of character against Fulham.
But Moyes will know that his side need to be starting games much better going forward.
The Toffees were a little fortunate to still be in the contest at the break against Fulham, and improvements are paramount as better opposition will be more clinical.
But the win on Saturday saw Everton do something pretty rare, which is mount a comeback away from home in the Premier League, according to Opta.
Surprisingly, Everton have only managed to do this on one other occasion in the past three seasons.
And that was also against Fulham, when Everton won 3-1 at Craven Cottage last season.
Raul Jimenez had given Fulham the lead, before Vitalii Mykolenko, Michael Keane and Beto all scored for Everton.
Everton’s collective mentality is encouraging at the moment
Everton coming from behind to win away games in the Premier League has been far too infrequent in recent times, but hopefully this will now pave the way for it to happen more often.
Ideally Everton won’t find themselves in losing positions too often.
But at least they’ve shown they are capable of getting back into away games to not only take a point, but to actually win.
Can you remember who the last player to do this for Everton was? 🤔
CLUE: It was all the way back in August 2014 vs Chelsea 🕵️♂️
Vitalii Mykolenko of Everton reacts during the Premier League match between Fulham and Everton.
Credit: Getty Images/Jacques Feeney/Offside.
But generally speaking, Everton’s collective mentality is promising at the moment.
That’s now three straight games where the players have managed to rescue points from losing positions. Clearly, Moyes says all the right things at half-time.
Now we just need to see the manager getting a tune out of them from that first whistle.
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