Goodison Park was accused of being a library by Fulham fans early on in this match but for much of the second half it growled and moaned in exasperation at another ugly Everton performance. Had Beto not popped up with a face-saving, stoppage-time equaliser, Sean Dyche’s team would almost certainly have been booed off the field for the third time this season. So much for the Grand Old Lady’s long farewell…

The negative impact on the players was a topic of discussion for the television commentary team and Dyche, no doubt, logged it in the memory banks for recall the next time he can say he and his side ”have been questioned”, but those expressions of frustration were symbolic of where this club is as the Farhad Moshiri years wind down.

Evertonians are simply sick of losing (or, at least, not winning), tired of being served up such ineffective, one-dimensional football that is utterly at odds with the Blues’ finest traditions, and are chafing at the limiting tactics of a manager currently failing his audition for the job of taking this famous old club into a (hopefully) brighter future at its brand new stadium next year.

There was a twisted irony, but one almost perfect for the Moshiri era, of Everton being comprehensively out-played, out-thought and out-manoeuvred on their own park by a team overseen by a manager they unceremoniously sacked five years ago… not to mention losing to a goal scored by a player they’d had to sell to remain compliant with Premier League spending rules.

This was an excruciating watch from the home fans’ perspective for all bar a few minutes here and there when Everton managed to rise above their torpor and show something closer to the level that many believe they could achieve under better stewardship.

The Blues could have been ahead just past the hour mark had Idrissa Gueye’s terrific shot dropped an inch lower and bounced in off the underside of the bar rather than cannoning back out or Dominic Calvert-Lewin not strayed offside for the umpteenth time this season before rapping the loose ball home.

 

And they showed some of the incisiveness in transition on which Dyche relies shortly before half-time and fashioning a move that ended with a pin-point Mykolenko delivery from the left but Dwight McNeil planting a firm header straight into Bernd Leno’s arms.

But Everton probably should have been a goal down by that stage, however, to a vibrant Fulham side who dominated the midfield throughout and exhibited the kind of tempo, movement and quickness of passing that, no doubt, had the watching Blues fans wondering what might have been had Marco Silva’s raw managerial tenure at Goodison not fallen apart in the manner it did in the autumn of 2019.

Raul Jimenez had tested Jordan Pickford early on after being allowed all the time he needed by the disappointing James Tarkowski to control the ball in the box and fire off a snapshot, the England keeper was forced to beat away a powerful effort from Adama Traoré following Vitalii Mykolenko’s horrendous giveaway on the edge of his own box, and Emile Smith Rowe should have hit the target with a volley off Jimenez’s inviting header back across goal.

And in a foreshadowing of the Cottagers’ goal, Jimenez was able to turn inside all too easily and shoot while Kenny Tete was allowed to run almost the length of the pitch before lashing over the crossbar before Issa Diop headed an Andreas Pereira cross over and Alex Iwobi despatched a volley into a similar spot at the end of the first half.

If the home faithful, many of them still miffed by the fact that the club’s best defensive player, Jarrad Branthwaite had only been named as a substitute in the name of loyalty to Michael Keane, had hoped for a more inspiring second-half display on the back of some words of encouragement in the dressing room, they were badly let down.

Everton lapsed into mind-numbing Dyche-ball, the ball routinely lumped forward by Pickford in the few minutes after the restart and Fulham, who had wisely doubled up on Iliman Ndiaye and tasked Diop and Calvin Bassey with picking up the second balls on the occasions they lost aerial battles with Calvert-Lewin, looked comfortable dealing with such predictable tactics.

And it was no surprise that the Cottagers carved out the first chance of the second period when Pereira screwed a shot across goal and then went ahead with an hour on the clock with a goal that was, frankly, embarrassing from the home side’s point of view.

Smith Rowe collected the ball just inside his own half and was given the freedom of Everton’s as he easily waltzed around McNeil, who was having a shocking game, evaded Ashley Young as the veteran waved a leg in front of him and then fed Iwobi 25 yards out.

The ex-Toffee still had plenty to do but with both James Tarkowski and Michael Keane backing off, he was ushered into the box to pick his spot with a strike inside Pickford’s right-hand post.

If anything, Fulham should have killed their hosts off and Silva was left to lament the fact that they didn’t. Antonee Robinson’s low cross had to be parried by Pickford, Iwobi’s volleyed pass across the face of goal shortly found no takers to tap in and Jimenez smashed one narrowly over with 12 minutes left while Everton didn’t have a shot in anger until substitute Jesper Lindstrom saw a deflected effort saved low by Leno.

Rather than doing anything to change his team’s approach, Dyche had gone like-for-like with his changes, with Beto replacing Calvert-Lewin and Orel Mangala coming on for Abdoulaye Doucouré, but it wasn’t until McNeil was forced off with a knee injury that desperation took hold, Branthwaite was introduced and Keane was pushed up front.

Mangala’s presence immediately upgraded Everton’s ability to move the ball through midfield and Beto had forced a corner with a blocked shot and prompted Leno to make a save with a header within minutes of coming on before his moment arrived four minutes into time added on at the end.

Everton had piled men forward trying to force home a late leveller, Ndiaye’s deep cross fell to Young in space off the back post and with a wonderfully cushioned, volleyed cross he found Beto unmarked to head past Leno.

The emotion that spilled out of the Portuguese was unmistakable and he would leave the field in tears that reflected his personal challenges trying to get minutes in a struggling team this season and having seized his rare opportunity.

For Everton’s fans, it was just relief and a tangible sense that their team and manager had undeservedly got out of jail; a run of games unbeaten somehow stretched to five and a chance to regroup ahead of back-to-back away games at Southampton and West Ham before the final International break of the year.

Dyche can rightly reflect on the resilience of his players and their refusal to give up but with a points tally of 48 last season when the points deductions are removed from the equation, the expectation this season, with only Amadou Onana departing from the group of regular starters over the summer, was that if the team couldn’t improve on what was, effectively a 12th-place finish, the Blues might at least tread water in mid-table comfort.

At the same time, the recent uptick in form and results has raised expectation levels for how Everton should approach teams at home, but they’re expectations that have collided head-on with the limitations of Dyche as a coach, a tactician and a strategist. The result was another forgettable display after the goalless draw with Newcastle (another fortunate draw that was depressingly short on entertainment and goalscoring chances for the home side).

Two games on the road, away from the demands of Goodison and where Everton are better suited with the way they play under Dyche, offer opportunities to extend this unbeaten run and, hopefully, push the club further away from the dogfight at the bottom.

In the meantime, a penny for the thoughts of The Friedkin Group as they survey from a distance what they will be acquiring and be required to rebuild should, as is anticipated, their takeover be ratified before the end of the year. The sights and sounds of a restless Goodison yearning for any sign of tangible forward progress will provide plenty of food for thought as they plan the structure of the coaching set-up in the months to come.


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