Sean Dyche was unable to contain his frustration after the final whistle of today’s deflating 3-1 defeat to West Ham, saying that his players have got to start taking their chances.
The Toffees should have ended a largely poor first half by taking the lead with their first penalty of the season but Beto squandered the perfect chance to score only his second Premier League goal of the season with a weak spot-kick that Alphonse Areola palmed aside.
The Portuguese had already spurned another great chance earlier in the first period but he did eventually find the net when he connected with a sumptuous James Garner cross but what was statistically the highest-rated goalkeeping performance of the season by Areola helped keep Everton at bay.
Dwight McNeil failed to convert from close range, Dominic Calvert-Lewin scuffed another shot when put in on the keeper and, overall, the Blues had 22 attempts at goal but only managed to score once.
West Ham, meanwhile, were clinical, equalising when Kurt Zouma out-jumped Ben Godfrey to head home a corner and then scoring twice in stoppage time, first through Tomas Soucek and then on the counter-attack through Edson Alvarez.
“I am looking at the quality we have got and it seems an odd thing,” Dyche said. “How we are not scoring more goals is just bizarre. If you score the second, it is a long way back for any team.
“You can’t say every week about xGs because it’s through the roof again. You have to go and score a goal.
“I’m frustrated because we’re doing good stuff. Too many games have got away from us at Goodison. We can’t keep creating chances and not killing a game off.
“The pressure is on us now to score goals. I can’t keep standing here and talking about xG.
“We create golden chances, we don’t take them and they had two chances and scored them both.”