Everton U21s 4 – 3 Sunderland U21s
Jarrad Branthwaite played the whole game and Nathan Patterson completed an hour after lining up for Everton’s Under-21s against Sunderland for their Premier League 2 clash on Sunday afternoon.
Both senior players were able to use a game that turned into a real ding-dong seven-goal battle to make significant progress along the path of recovery to match fitness after operations have seen them both sidelined for months.
Branthwaite, in particular, has been a huge miss in the first team’s defence and the fact that he came through 90 minutes will come as a massive boon to Sean Dyche and his team as they prepare for back-to-back home games against Crystal Palace and Newcastle before the next international break.
Patterson, meanwhile, can add a much-needed option at right-back where Seamus Coleman’s season has already been disrupted by injury, Roman Dixon has been overlooked in the past two Premier League games on the grounds of his inexperience and Ashley Young has been needed on the other side of defence to cover for Vitalii Mykolenko’s illness.
It’s not clear yet whether either player will be deemed ready to play any part against Palace next weekend — Branthwaite would appear to have the stronger case — but it would be realistic to expect them both to be ready for the clash with the Magpies, assuming they continue to feel no reaction in training.
For today’s U21s game, Paul Tait did not have Harrison Armstrong or Dixon at his disposal after both travelled with the senior squad to Leicester City, a situation that is likely to continue while Dyche’s options are limited by injury.
Everton had to play catch-up as Sunderland twice took the lead, with Omari Benjamin equalising first inside two minutes, then Charlie Whitaker levelling after the break with a penalty when Sunderland had scored again just before half-time.
Everton took the lead when Benjamin scored his second but this time Sunderland came back to make it 3-3.
The scoring was not over, however, as substitute Jack Butler popped up with the crucial winner just a couple of minutes from the end.
Everton U21s: G Pickford, N Patterson (61′ Butler), Heath, Samuels-Smith, Branthwaite, Moonan, Benjamin, Butterfield [Y:37′], Sherif (18′ Barker), Bates, (82′ J Patterson [Y:90+4′]), Whitaker (82′ Beaumont-Clark)
Subs not Used: Barnsley