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.”