Everton suffered a 1-0 loss to Arsenal at the Hill Dickinson Stadium on Saturday. While Viktor Gyokeres’ penalty from Jake O’Brien’s handball decided the contest, the Toffees failed to threaten David Raya’s goal.
The hosts ended the game without a single shot on target and have failed to score in their last two matches. Although the Blues also drew a blank against Chelsea in their 3-0 loss at Stamford Bridge, chances were there for the taking, most notably when Iliman Ndiaye hit the woodwork late in the game.
Against Mikel Arteta’s side, however, Everton failed to create clear-cut chances.
"You can play a well as you like and do good things but we need to get some goals. We've not had goals in the last two games, which is the bit that's been missing really,” David Moyes told BBC Sport after the game.
"We done a lot of things, the players effort, the spirit. Everything you'd want them to do they did. It was just a bit of quality or trying to hurt Arsenal a bit more. Arsenal have given up very few chances and we just didn't get enough opportunities.”
Everton were also missing several key players for this game. Iliman Ndiaye and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall’s absences, in particular, were felt strongly as the Toffees ended the game with no big chances, zero shots on target, 35% ball possession and with a measly expected goals (xG) metric of 0.20.
“Well, there's no excuses, you know, because other people lose players as well, so we've got no excuses with it,” added Moyes.
“I thought the players were doing a great job, certainly their energy, their commitment, all those words you would use for the performance, they tried to show it, tried to show everything about it.
“The quality we lacked at times, our passing wasn't as good. It was probably one of the poorest we've had with the ball.”
Reader Comments (3)
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2 Posted 21/12/2025 at 14:06:50
He looks pretty sharp, doesn't he?
3 Posted 21/12/2025 at 14:57:07
No shit Sherlock, doh!
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1 Posted 21/12/2025 at 13:41:29
Every season, we seem to be dogged by a pedestrian build-up in attack, and an overall lack of mobility and pace.
It's crazy because Moyes was one of the first in this league to introduce almost wingbacks when we had Baines and Coleman in their pomp.
Now, it feels like we have two fullbacks from the 1970's, although in fairness to O'Brien, he's a central defender and the project at right-back has run it's course.
But we need pace and dynamism – I can't stress this enough, most teams these days attack with droves of men, confident they have the engine on them to be almost box-to-box players.
We have too many players that are still too one-paced and the weakness in our forward line is also exposed greatly.
Barry is far too lightweight in this league I'm afraid.