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Match Summary A shock for many Evertonians was the news that Richard Wright had picked up an injury and was ruled out, giving Espen Baardsen his chance in goal for the Blues against one of his old clubs, barely a week before his one-month emergency loan contract was due to end. Brian McBride made his expected debut also, as he starts a three-month loan spell from MLS side Columbus Crew. The Egyptian defender, Ibrahim Said, on loan from Al Alhy, was on the bench, along with young Leon Osman — back from three months loan with Carlisle United. With almost an entire squad missing from injuries and suspensions, this was always going to be a big challenge for David Moyes and the players whose pride took such a knock last week at Gay Meadow. Everton started well, getting the ball forward effectively with Radzinski running well at the Spurs defence. The early efforts were rewarded in grand style when a nice passing movement started by Yobo saw Naysmith feed the ball back to Gemmill who set up McBride, making a perfect run onto his perfect through ball, and the American was off to the races, neatly slotting home past his compatriot Kasey Keller in the Tottenham goal for a dream start to his brief Premiership career. Another excellent pick by David Moyes! But at the other end, it looked sadly like the forced selection of Espen Baardsen would lead to trouble as he was clearly mentally unready for this one, fluffing a simple Stubbs backheader for an unnecessary corner and it was almost inevitable that Poyet should score, pushing the ball wide of the despairing Norwegian. Things were therefore even after 15 minutes, and that's the they stayed until half-time as Spurs came into the game more after a shaky start, and Everton failed once again to capitalize on the psychological advantage of that early goal. Corners were taken short, and largely wasted; promising free-kicks were poorly utilized or blasted high, wide and not so handsome. As usual, there was no-one to command the midfield, and Unsworth didn't help, pushing the ball long on most occasions. Fortunately, after another dreadful misjudgment, Baardsen started to handle the ball with more confidence, and the at-times desperate defending lead by Yobo to protect Baardsen would hopefully be less necessary... But the second half turned into a goal-fest, with Spurs coming off slightly better than Everton, thanks initially to a favourable offside decision that saw Keane gain the advantage and waltz around Baardsen. But Everton, to their credit, fought back manfully from this setback, and it was Steve Watson who slotted home the equalizer from short range after Keller had miraculously turned around a point-blank goal-bound Stubbs header. But the ding-dong tone of the second half had been established and it was Keane again who benefited from an uncharacteristic Yobo error when the usually immaculate defender stepped forward to try and intercept a forward ball but missed it completely and once again, Robbie was off to the races, firing in with Baardsen well stranded. Surely that was it: 3-2. No, the attacks kept coming, with Iversen shooting fractionally wide, then Li Tie picking up the ball and advancing into the centre with determination before releasing a strong ball toward Naysmith in the D. He saw Radzinski advancing and fired a perfect one-touch pass into the path of the advancing Pole, who launched an inch-perfect rocket that flashed between Keller's outstretched glove and his right-hand post. All square for the third time! Twenty minutes left. Free-kicks, subs, wild shots... who would get the anticipated winner? Well, with Keane on a hat-trick, the ink on the script was already drying when Stubbs misjudged a lofted ball from deep and once again it was raceday for the Irish lad, dodging past Yobo before drilling home the winner past a despairing Baardsen. So, a fabulous achievement by Everton to finally score 3 goals in a Premiership match this season... Now, what do we do about stopping the other lot from scoring? Seems we've lost our defensive prowess somewhere along the way.
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| Tottenham
Hotspur (4-4-2) White shirts, dark blue shorts, white socks |
Everton (4-4-2) Blue shirts, white shorts, blue socks |
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Shrewsbury Town (A)
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