Everton U21s 2 – 1 Middlesbrough U21s
Everton U21s return to their Premier League 2 campaign for the visit of Middlesbrough to Walton Hall Park on Friday night. Kick-off is at 7 pm BST.
The match will be streamed on Everton TV for evertontv+, Forever Blue+ and Season Ticket Members, with coverage beginning at 6:55 pm BST.
Everton U21 Head Coach David Hughes picked a pretty strong side.
The visitors hit the woodwork after 10 minutes when a shot bobbled in front of George Pickford and he pushed it onto the post and across his goal.
Middlesbrough drove through the Everton defence far too easily after 12 minutes, this time in off the post to give them the lead. They scored again before the quarter hour but that was flagged offside.
A brilliant run by Finney down the right wing almost set up Graham, but only won a corner.
Everton weathered the storm and a great steal by birthday boy Jack Patterson (39′) saw him drive forward to the penalty area before picking his spot superbly to level the game at half-time.
Graham had a couple of good chances early in the second half. And a tremendous long ball over the top from Gardner picked out Braiden Graham (58′) scampering into space and he finished with great composure.
Shea Pita returned from a long injury to come on as a sub. Everton had to defend deeper and deeper as the game continued but they held on for a very creditable win.
Everton U21s: G Pickford, Finney, Carrington, Gardner, Dodds, Patterson [Y:90+1′], Nsangou (68′ Pita), Matos, Loney (81′ Clarke), Olayiwola [Y:24′] (56′ Bates), Graham.
Subs not Used: Barnsley, Van Schoor, Gomez, Benjamin.