Everton in control after thumping Young Boys in Bern

Save Naismith for Leicester ?

Much maligned Naismith sets up the under performing Coleman.

Even a bit of luck with the offside decision.

Maybe we should get a synthetic pitch at Goodison?

Atsu definitely deserves a run out, and who better to replace than a (so far) lackluster Mirallas.

have to tip your hat to their goal, and that was a top class header from Lukaku. hopefully he zips the mouths of his (too numerous) TW critics.

Shocking penalty. Getting some breaks here.

We’ve been different class.
Lukaku should have had 5.

Where has this team been all season?

Did we really play with just 10 men for the last half hour? No exaggeration, if we had been more clinical in our final pass and finishing it could have been double figures.

A good hard lesson for John Stones too without being too costly.

Cracking win and performance.

Great performance. Naismith was class

3 - 7 would have been a fair result

Barry had a good game after all the stick he’s had recently and Naismith was back to his best.

McCarthey being back gives all a lift! One or two silly yellows that could come back to haunt us in future rounds!

What’s Warsaw like in May ?!?!

So many Everton players played well, even Barry was very good.

One of Barkley’s best games in an Everton shirt, shame about the Stones red card.

Anyone know how many games he will miss?

Stones showed his inexperience but he’s a great find and will learn from it whilst on the European stage Mirallas just showed himself for what he is. Selfish.

Now Bobby and the boys have to take that form into Sunday’s game against ’no hopers’ Leicester and show us they can do ’the day job’ as well as the Thursday Stroll!

Can we get one of those pitches at Goodison?

Worth remembering this side hasn’t lost a home European tie for ages so we shouldn’t diminish the achievement.

Other major plus was the obvious team spirit which has been the big worry. And we got goals which was my other serious concern. Please let’s carry this form through. So pleased for those who travelled.

Plus points were the Garbutt and Atsu cameos, they both looked comfortable on the ball and it would be nice to see Atsu have a bit longer on the pitch.

Good display, but not excellent; we got the rub of the green tonight... Overdue, yes, but a decent win: well done.

A Young Boys side that hasn’t lost a game in Europe at home for 3 years,score goals for fun, and finished runners up in their group second to Napoli who they beat at home 2-0.

MotM was Naismith; for me, he did everything apart from score he is a leader on the pitch.

Good to see Barkley look fit and sharp making the correct decisions. Mirallas can go – he is a gobshite and typifies everything wrong with the modern footballer!

Hope Lukaku uses this as a springboard now.

3 points against Leicester and the season starts to get better.

A word for Rom whom I’ve slagged off badly but thought he was excellent, Yes he should have had 6 but 3 will do. Also very encouraged by Coleman tonight, looked leaner and focused.

Stones will learn.

The more I look back on that game the happier I am.

Every one of them was superb in my view... apart from (and this is only my opinion) Mirallas – he just looks as though he can’t be bothered. Yes, he’s a threat but at times looked like he didn’t care. He won’t be missed when he moves to Real, Barça, Bayern or whoever else gets involved in the bidding war.

That said, we could have hit 7 or 8 tonight. I just hope that fills us with confidence for the rest of the season.

Whatever the European style is, can’t fault Roberto for having it on European nights. Doesn’t suit the following Saturday though... Sunday.

Don’t be fooled by them downing tools, and saying we battered them. Look at the whole game, thru objective glasses – not blue-tinted ones. As I said, a good performance – no more than that... and I don’t care what anyone says: we got the rub, more than overdue. If we beat Leicester 4-1, I’d be convinced.

Other than a Timmy howler for the first goal we battered them from pillar to post.

As mentioned the back 4 need to stop dicking about with it and clear the lines when required, Naismith my MotM worked his arse off all night.

Still buzzing...

I’ve been one of RM’s biggest critics but a strange playing surface, a team unbeaten at home in 3 years in Europe!

Gotta be happy with that, moi san.

Leicester will be a different ball game but a win of this magnitude breeds confidence and credit where credits due, the manager got it right tonight.

I’ll settle for a 1-0 on Saturday by the way.

He should get 20+ by the end of the season and help turn us into a ’top’ club. Well done tonight, lads, but we need the same on Sunday as we don’t want a relegation battle to distract our Europa League effort!

We awake......

COYB.

A bit of credit is due to Two Assists Barry and Non-Stop Naismith tonight given their recent (and deserved criticism).

Rom also looked like the striker he can be when given some decent service. He really needs to play facing goal, not back to it, though his hold-up and link-up play was good tonight, too.

The only tiny blemish on my evening was Kevin Ratcliffe. Great player, club legend but what a miserable arse. Slaughtered Howard for the goal and seemed to need no second invitation to criticise or sound unimpressed. His praise for the win was grudging at best. Cheer up, Kev.

Now PLEASE PLEASE take that confidence and form into the Leicester game.

The trouble is they need to play like that in the Premier League too – if they want to play in the Premier League next season... still not out the drop zone yet.

Stones and Barkley showed naivety, but hopefully will benefit from the experience. We were much more comfortable with the time and space afforded by the opposition, should have scored more, but defended badly at times. European football is a steep learning curve, we seem to be on it, but there may be other teams ahead of the game.

But for tonight, great scoreline, gutted I didn’t go, well done to all who did.

Hopefully Oviedo’s injury isn’t too serious but it’s a chance for Garbutt to show his worth if he gets a run in the side. It was great to see Ross looking a lot more confident on the ball as well. Lukaku easily should have had five or six rather than the measly three he put away though. What a useless lump!

He’s hasn’t captured last seasons form and we’ve missed his marauding runs, but I think this goal will do him a world of good.

Really pleased with the way the team played. The passing and movement was excellent. The play for Coleman’s (offside) goal was something Barcelona in their pomp would’ve been proud of. Barkley also looked very sharp and dangerous. Stones will learn from his error.

I thought the officials were awful. Offside for one of our goals, yellow cards like confetti for most of our players, Sanogo should’ve been off for his kick at Ross’s head, yet only Ross gets a card?

As an aside, not surprised to still be reading some negativity on here. Unbeaten at home in Europe in 3 years, and we batter them 4-1 with 10 men playing some fantastic football. Yes, they had chances, but we also had tons of chances which we could’ve buried. Yes, Barkley could’ve been sent off, but Sanogo could’ve done too.

Lukaku, Barry, Naismith and Barks each had their best games of the season. Howard was playing under a magnifying glass and didn’t disappoint.

On the negative side; we still have to work on defending corners. RM doesn’t rate them, but everybody else does.

Again there is a comment focusing on something negative about Barkley. I don’t understand what some blues want. We’ve got an outstanding young talent there who will get better and better the more he plays and the experts on here keep saying he shouldn’t be picked and only want to talk about what he did wrong.

We were fantastic tonight, there’s no point looking for negatives in that performance, it won’t do any good, so we should be simply looking to take the positive attitude into the next game.

And Lukaku’s second goal wasn’t offside because Barry’s ball was a pull back, which then went forward off the defender. Highly frustrating when even the commentators don’t seem to know the rules of football.

One final rant, why the hell did ITV include a feature on Daniel Sturridge as part of the build up to our game? Twats.

Shades of last season in some of the movement with the fullbacks being played in further up the pitch. Gives Stones a breather for the second leg anyway and gets rid of any lingering suspension for him later in the tournament.

The opposition may not be great, but they are not awful, and winning 1-4 away from home on an artificial pitch is fantastic work. We did what we needed to do, now we need to get some wins in the Premier League so we can fully concentrate on the Europa League.

To be honest I can’t stand ITV coverage of games.

I still havn’t forgiven them for going to a commercial break during the "live" coverage of that merseyside derby where we scored during the add break.

It was like we got our team back tonight, and scoring four goals away from home, should do wonders for the team’s confidence.

Most pleasing thing tonight was how much sharper we looked, to show that sometimes, football really is all about yourselves!

COYB

Great result; why can’t we do this in the league is the question..

Leicester and Arsenal, 6 points in the bag? According to some on here tonight, no problem. I am more of a realist. We are on 27 points after 25 games, with -4:gd for a reason,

Oh just let’s forget about all the first 6 months of the season because we have had 1 good win, wake up will you!

A player’s player of the highest quality, who has nowhere near reached his full potential, he would improve most teams. Hopefully our future captain as well?

Well they played tonight. Howard was good, couple of very decent saves, Coleman marauded, Jags was excellent, Barry set up and Naismith worked his nuts off... And Lukaku a hat-trick.

I take the view that YB were not that good tonight, but they had a great home record. It was a decent performance. More pace, more width and the big players starting to play again.

Same again at the weekend chaps! Well done Roberto, learn, learn and learn some more and tweak it.

All-in-all, happy days. Players looked like they were enjoying themselves and nice to see some smiling faces again.

Stones had a bit of a shocker but let’s hope he learns from that and improves his decision making of when and when not to play, bloody love him though. Reminds me so much of Tony Adams.

A few iffy moments but a great result.

Thought Barkley did well, Stones had his worst game and I could watch Naismith all night.

He plays every game with the enthusiasm of a kid and everything about him says ’I fucking hate losing’ (my kind of player and I wish we had three or four more like him).

Up the Toffees!

One of the positives was they just rolled their sleeves up after a goal down and did not let their heads drop. Lots of good individual performances but IMO they seemed to have a better understanding as a team.

The only negative I seen was the injury to Oviado and hope it is not to serious.

Lukaku’s hat trick did our approach play justice and yes, he really could have had a double hat trick (how many times did I think that when "The Latch" was at his pomp ?).

At half time my Dad said he thought that the ref was extremely lenient towards YBB and that we would be made to pay for much more cheap behaviour in the remainder.

Sadly, Stones’ red was naive and unnecessary. No game changer, but hopefully a real lesson for him. Great young lad who will certainly iron out his rare but dreadful errors...... the impulsiveness of youth. His action was desperate, thoughtless and needless given the circumstances. So all in all, not a bad moment to fuck up.

If anything JS chose a very good moment to get it badly wrong and got lucky with the missed pen. Hopefully, the lesson is well learned.

Well deserved result for the performance.

Looking forward to more of the same in the return leg and for the remainder of the season.

"Great result today. We keep dreaming. do not worry about my injury, I’m fine."

If ever you needed proof of BBC bias checkout the ’football page’....2nd headline is the Shite scratching a 1-0 home win with a pen (again!) Everton’s result (of the draw) is a mere footnote.... scumbags!! COYB!

Who thought when we went 1-0 down it was all over? ... I know I did.

I have my long-term doubts over Martinez as a Premier League manager (may he soon prove me wrong), but up to now, both he and we seem to have this Europa League thing, at least for the moment, sussed out good style.

We pull down, quite rightly, the Prem Refs, who seem to work on a slightly different set of values to the ordinary supporter. But these foreign Johnnies take the biscuit.

What happens at Leicester will be a different kettle of fondu. I doubt they will want to come out and go toe to toe with us but, given how far behind they are, one point is not much use to them, so you never know.

Well worth getting up at 0345 to watch... and I haven’t been able to say that much this season.

Purely by accident you understand I watched it via the American Fox Sports 2. For Yanks it wasn’t bad. Better in fact than the Redshite love-in / bias as reported by viewers in the UK.

More of the same in the Prem please Roberto... if you can.

People are quick to make a negative out of a performance. Yes, we had a bit of the rub of the green but we could easily on the other hand been close to double figures tonight.

If we get a big win against Leicester, some will still rant on about our next game. Take each game at a time but for Christ’s sake, give the team some credit for tonight’s performance.

Was glad to see Garbutt get a run out, nearly got an assist with his first attack. What people don’t seem to appreciate is that it is difficult for a new or young player to make an impact when just given brief cameo 20-30 min run outs once every few games.

If he was given a run of games and given the chance to gain full match fitness and earn the confidence of his team mates, thus gaining the confidence in himself, we would see a lot more quality crosses coming from him into the box for others to put away. He oozes quality and he is nowhere near his full potential.

Sadly I suspect we will be seeing him breaking Baines’s full-back assist record with another club.

That said, we have to start showing this in the Premier League. The disconnect between Europa and Prem performances is getting bizarre. Anyone any theories on that anomaly?

Far too many TW people adopt an attitude that despite an outright win, that last weeks Euromillions jackpot was even bigger!

Great result, great performance. Can only add to our growing confidence.

Anyway, enough of being churlish. Tonight it was a pleasure watching our team. Let’s thump Leicester on Sunday.

Unfortunately, Andy, I watched the greatest Everton team ever (1985) and he wouldn’t have got a game. If we want to be at the top competing, then it will not be with Steven in the side. Till that happens, I am happy to see him working his plumbs off for the mighty Blues.

Then, in 20 years, I will celebrate him at a dinner where he will be remembered as being part of the 2015 Europa League winners...

Anyone who says we didn’t get the rub... Bollox! But it’s all good, innit – that’s football.

Anyone who says we could have had seven, yes... but that would be when they’re 4-1 down and chasing it.

Anyone who thinks I’m changing my mind on Lukaku... Well, I hope he comes good because it’s win-win if he does but we put at least 6 on a plate tonight and he scored 3. He looks up for offside when he’s through and misses a sitter on another... and to pull it apart even further, he was one lucky lazy fuker for that second one. Why was he even considered to be offside. I’m pleased for him though I wish we could play him in Europe every week.

I was pleased with the Lukaku hat-trick and the dominance of Barkley. I hope this continues in the weeks to come.

I am delighted with that performance, playing a quicker tempo and as Ian @ 127 said, playing to Lukaku’s strength. Also spot on Ian about Luke Garbutt, he was excellent when he came on. Let’s do it takes right now to resolve his contract right now.

There are times when he is exactly what we need, and there are times when his presence holds us back. Roberto’s job is to recognise the difference between these situations and use Naismith accordingly.

I also think he tires later on in games, you can see him visibly flagging as he moves. I would want him on the bench at least every game, as he can come on, lift the team and grab a goal, but he can’t keep playing every minute.

What was more infuriating was the commentators mentioning how Stevie Slipup was going to be their studio guest while we were still looking like racking up more in Switzerland. Twats.

Re Oviedo, he’s tweeted that his injury isn’t too bad, which is good news. Garbutt looks good but surely Oviedo is the man in possession and should get a run? Same argument as many applied to Robles.

I think last night shows we’re best suited to playing on the counter away from home. RM’s challenge is to find a way past sides who combine pressing high up and parking the bus at Goodison. On that showing, Naismith and Ross are the key.

Have to say McCarthy looked like the player we all know he is – vital to our fortunes. When he was out over Christmas, I was convinced that was a major factor. I’m hoping this side can begin to push on now.

Talent is great, and I agree Naismith doesn’t seem the most talented, but what he lacks in skill, he definitely makes up for with sheer effort.

I watched the match with my lad who constantly went on about Naismith’s distribution compared to Ross Barkley. He said that Barkley doesn’t need to work as hard because he has got well more ability. Only 15 my son, so I had to argue with him about how good Barkley would be if he worked as hard as Steven Naismith in every game.

I think it’s a really bad shout to call the manager a phoney, Ant, and although it’s early days, wouldn’t it be great if Martinez, pulled off the football equivalent of the classic "Rope A Dope"!

We were excellent last night against a very good team. Admittedly, we’ve been shocking for a lot of this season and the team and manager have come in for a lot of criticism. You can’t whinge about that performance last night though. Any attempt to do so is childish.

Don’t go making proclamations based on what you think is going to happen.

Just think realise is also about seeing the whole picture. There was very little negative about last night... yet still people find something. Praise them for a great performance. It’s one performance and they need to do it again against Leicester, but praise them...not "yeah but........" Sorry.. rant over

If Martinez’s legacy was that he was a good cup manager, and put a couple of trophies on the board, then that would do me. We are not going to qualify for CL as things stand because we just cannot compete financially. I’ve accepted that but I would love this club to win something again. Sadly, in this modern era, I know I am in a minority.

Great that Oviedo isn’t badly hurt as this lad deserves a steady run after his bad injury and I cannot think of any game where he has disappointed. Young Luke is firing himself right into the picture also so I never thought it but we can afford to rest Bainesy occasionally it seems.

Final word for last night, let’s not get carried away because this was just Young Boys’ 3rd game back from their winter break so the score maybe flattered us although we could have had 7.

it was enjoyable to watch last night. I am not going to say we played unbelievable, now we’re going to win the cup. What I am going to say is we played the standard that we watched every game last season; the fight was there and it just proves they can do It when they want to. Let’s just hope this is a turning point.

I hope Lukaku picks up from this. I don’t want to be a negative sod but he could’ve had 6 or 7 last night... stupid misses and the offside. I read he is the player in the Premier League for most offsides this season.

The days of cup teams like Arsenal, Spurs and Man Utd in the 70s and 80s are gone. It’s rare for a cup to be won by a club not seriously in contention for the title. Four doubles in history up until the start of the Premier League era, how many since?

Last season some of us complained about going out in the cup competitions, when we were going well in the league. We complained, because they are different competitions, and as numerous examples from recent times have demonstrated, Cup and League form is different (Wigan have shown that most obviously recently, as have the likes of Liverpool, Chelsea, Real etc). We are rightly happy about the result, and those expressed their happiness in a season with a lack of it, do not need to read stupid comments like the following: ’Leicester and Arsenal, 6 points in the bag? According to some on here tonight, no problem. I am more of a realist. We are on 27 points after 25 games, with -4:gd for a reason,’

Please tell me who is claiming we will beat Arsenal? Explicitly or via implication? Many expect we will beat Leicester, and rightly so, because we should beat them, even if the Europa League tie will have sapped some of our energy, and hindered our preparations. But I do not expect us to beat an in-form Arsenal away from home, along with the 99% of other Everton fans.

I think their back 4 playing a high line helped us and left space for Lukaku to run into. I thought Barkley had his best game this season – he knew what he wanted to do everytime he got the ball. On most occasions, he looked to run at the opposition which is Barkley’s strength.

I thought Garbutt was excellent when he came on; I think he was better than Oviedo. The thought of the lad walking away at the end of the season for nothing is surely unthinkable.

I think it’s clear that Premier League teams have sussed out how to set up against us but, as yet, European teams haven’t. As long as we avoid Tottenham or the RS we may go far.

Atsu played great when he came on and will be useful after a good ANC.

Barkley struggles under weight of home expectations at the mo but is a good player and was his normal self last night, a player you would much rather have than face.

Barry showed why we bought him. In the closing stages he was so composed just in front of defence. Problems occur in premiership because the minimum required in EPL from the smaller to the bigger teams is press, press, press and it shows us up. We are set up with personnel and formation, and tactics that works much better in Europe. To do it in EPL requires top top drawer midfielders. Chelsea, Man Utd, Man City must have midfielders with an average value of £20M+, compared to our average value of £10M–

Lukaku showed why we took an expensive punt but also why he’s not good enough for Chelsea.

25 games, 27 points, -4 GD, Just in case you forgot, and not out of the woods, 1 swallow, etc with this manager and board.

Chris, I saw an article a couple of days ago which stated that Lukaku was the player caught offside the most in the League, and he has strayed offside ten times more already this season than he did in the whole of last season. Something must have changed in the way he’s playing or where he’s playing.

Romelu Lukaku – worst player in the Premier League.

Great result. Baffling dichotomy between European and domestic form. Shows how crucial confidence and liberty is I suppose.

Ant, we are aware of league form. Enjoying this win is not the same as saying everything is okay.

We know all the negatives, we’ve talked about them plenty. We finally put in a very good performance last night, which reminded us all of how good we were last season and gave us hope that we can be that good again in the rest of the season, I don’t really understand what you’re trying to do.

You seem either to be trying to tell us (a) "we’re still shit" or (b) "one result doesn’t mean anything". Neither of these are true. On it’s own, this result only means we’re overwhelmingly likely to qualify for the last 16, but as we’ve seen over the last few months, form and confidence are extremely important in football, and last night looks like it could be a huge turning point.

So, yes, of course we still need to perform and get results against Arsenal and Leicester, but we all know that anyway, it doesn’t need pointing out on the thread about the Young Boys game. Also, praising our performance last night and being happy about it is in no way detrimental to us getting results in the upcoming league games. In fact, the generation of a ’feel-good’ factor (which you seem to be a lone voice in trying to prevent) could be a vital element in having a strong finish to the season.

Enjoy the victory for what it was – we totally outclassed a hitherto unbeaten team on their own artificial turf this season. Let’s then hope that this transports into the confidence to rip Leicester a new one come Sunday, and not before then should you be the harbinger of doom and gloom if we fail to put them away.

Oddball, one of the great film characters of all time.

Woof woof! thats my other dog impression...

For those claiming Howard is at fault for the first goal, exactly how is that? In one of the other Cup games yesterday, the same shot but from a left foot bending over and around the keeper into the left upper part of the goal, was called a perfect shot, nothing the keeper could do. The announcers on Fox and during the game called it a scorer’s goal, nothing the keeper could do. Notice that the much raved about Young Boys’ ’keeper let one right through the 5-hole (unacceptable) and deflected another to Lukaku on the back post and then see how well TH did!

Martinez had the starters right and I know the injury and red changed things but why not get either Lukaku or Mirallas off sooner by substituting Atsu at 70 minutes or even 65?

Howard has played very well in both the Chelsea and Young Boys games. Neither goals were his fault. Since when was Robles’s positioning faultless?

Peach of a goal from their in-form striker. The only way Robles would have saved it (my! how times have changed) is if he morphed into Reed Richards from the Fantastic Four.

I for one am glad we have Robles and Howard keeping each other on their game. Our central defence could have rushed at him, the blame is with them then also but we should be happy that we have 2 capable goalkeepers vying for that № 1 spot.

My choice would be Robles until he messes up but I guess we have to see what happens.

Do you think Howard should have come back into the team versus Chelsea seeing as Robles had done little wrong in the previous games?

Howard is considered our number one goalie so he is always going to come back in straight away.

The same with Jags, Baines, Lukaku etc

Yes Robles had some good games, Howard played well against Chelsea and was beaten by a deflection and not even Robles could have made a difference with a deflected shot.

He played well last night with a couple of great saves and yes we can argue their goal and his positioning but I saw it as a brilliantly placed shot by their in-form striker, who had masses of time to decide where to place it.

All due to the defence not closing him down, not Howard.

My main point is, in my opinion, Robles was treated badly by Martinez when he was dropped for the Chelsea game. Howard maybe the Number One goalkeeper – it doesn’t mean he is the best, but again it’s just opinion.

We have not had much to cheer about, but last night’s performance deserves praise and let’s cross Sunday’s bridge when it comes.

Robles is still young and will get another chance, but for me Howard is our Number One goalkeeper and I’m glad to see him back between the sticks.

Same could be said about Bobby Mimms – he didn’t concede many in the league in our 86 season but, when big Nev was fit, it was a no-brainer to bring your best goalkeeper back into the team.

If you care to look at the Premier League table, mate, you will see that Everton are only 5 points off the drop zone, yeah?
I don’t know what table you were looking at, mate, but if Everton do not beat Leicester City next game are you going to be telling me that then? I take it you know who Everton have got next in the Premier League after the Leicester game? We are not going to be winning that one. Maybe you were reading the table up side down, mate.

During the game there were times when rather than do a Robles and just hoof it out he passed to players who were closely marked – a trait he has been guilty of this season though I suspect it is because of the Manager's "possession" football. He's also guilty of flapping at crosses.

He may well be our No 1 but I really think we need to look at the goalie position this close season.

The eighties... what a time that was...

Stones was stupid to commit the faul he did, but he will learn.

Lukaku is a goalscorer, 13 in a bad half-season, he could get 25 if we get going.

Still, Leicester will be tougher opponent.

Can anyone definitely say that Stones will only miss one match? I assumed a straight res would be more than a single match.