ROMELU LUKAKU AND Ross Barkley struck in the second half as Everton beat West Ham 2-0 at home to win for the first time in five Premier League games.
Barkley forced Adrian into a magnificent save in the best moment of a goalless opening period at Goodison Park.
Lukaku then netted with a simple header shortly after the break before setting up Barkley to seal the win in the closing stages.
West Ham are Lukaku’s favourite Premier League opponents – he has now scored in seven consecutive top-flight matches against them, one short of a record held by Robin van Persie for a scoring streak against Stoke City.
The opener also saw Lukaku notch his 50th Premier League goal, the third Everton player to reach the milestone after Duncan Ferguson and Tim Cahill.
Everton’s first win in five league games ensures they end the week in sixth position and sit just five points behind leaders Manchester City. Slaven Bilic’s men, meanwhile, stay 16th after what is already their sixth defeat of the season.
Unchanged West Ham threatened first when Manuel Lanzini and Dimitri Payet combined to set up Pedro Obiang, with the midfielder blazing over a presentable chance as the home defence bore down on him.
Joel Robles, in for the injured Maarten Stekelenburg as one of two Everton changes, had to get down sharply to save a deflected effort from Payet, while Lanzini should have done better after showing neat footwork to create an opportunity for himself before firing wide.
Everton were not without chances either and Gareth Barry’s curling shot found the roof of the net after Lukaku had led a rapid counterattack.
The best chance of the half saw Adrian come to the fore, the goalkeeper stretching brilliantly to keep out Barkley’s close-range effort after the Everton playmaker had gathered Bryan Oviedo’s cutback and shimmied past Winston Reid.
Everton took the lead five minutes into the second half after Reid’s poor clearance led to Seamus Coleman seeing a long-range shot parried by Adrian. Yannick Bolasie somehow got to the rebound first and kept the ball alive, allowing Lukaku to convert a simple header from only a few yards out.
Barkley curled an effort over from 20 yards, while Michail Antonio forced Robles into action at the other end after Bilic had brought on Andre Ayew in a bid to change his side’s fortunes.
Robles had to make another from Mark Noble’s curling long-range strike, while Simone Zaza was also introduced from the substitutes’ bench.
But Everton sealed victory with 14 minutes remaining. Barkley started the move himself, finding Lukaku down the right before getting on the end of the striker’s cross at the back post to slide in with his left foot.
West Ham offered little from then on, with only Adrian’s quick reactions denying Lukaku another goal after he connected with Tom Cleverley’s cross and Idrissa Gueye having a strong penalty claim turned down as Ronald Koeman’s men returned to form.
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Spot on.
I share the undercooked concern. Choose close to full team, rest anyone with a niggle or still jaded from last weeks heat. Warm ups are over, time to build momentum.
Murray; first of all, I have really enjoyed the podcasts so far from France, so thank you for that.
My amateur opinion is that they should go full strength and treat the SA game like a final. Even if it’s a narrow loss, they’ll know that they’re close to the standard required to win the competition. If they win, then the belief will become huge. You have to bear in mind that Ireland have had some less good performances last Autumn and in the 6N, but they’re kept winning and so surely they have that winning mindset. This is pretty rare and the winning run is worth fighting for.
One question for you would be about training. I’d be happy if they were having a few savage full contact sessions, as these may be tougher than a match against a tier 2 nation, but the squad size is restricted so this may not be possible. Would this be another argument for going full strength against Tonga? I’d really like to see the line out attack come back and to deny Tonga from scoring a try.
Maybe the answer to this in 4 years is to line up top opposition in friendlies leading into the world cup. I get they need to get the A team up to 100% preperation firing for the SA game but at the expense of picking up injuries again the minnows before then is a risky plan…
@Stuart: You are probably right… but I think the IRFU found it difficult to line up a game against other tier 1 nations. The England game was probably lined up from 4 years ago. Maybe they left it too late to arrange the others and it wouldn’t be extraordinary to think that they were disorganised or complacent.
@Stuart: apparently other top tier nations turned down playing against Ireland in the summer internationals. Not sure if they left it too late or if other teams felt it would show their hand too much.
In all likelihood yourself and the others on media duties are aware of the team (as normal) but cannot spell it out BUT you’re trying to slowly row your way back from the, way off, potential team you posted a few days ago…. Nice try. It’ll be about 12 from first 15 and Big Joe may be on his way to being first 15 with anyone carrying minor niggle sitting it out. Murray knew a few weeks ago Big Joe would get his shot
Are we not finding excuses to talk ourselves into the very same situation that killed us in previous world cups – ie no trust in the wider squad and thereby overloading the core group? What you are saying, Murray, is that should Ireland win the WC, they would play basically the same team for 6 matches in a row (with only minor alterations from the remaining 7th game). That’s a tough message to the squad and it does not fit the McCloskey inclusion.
@John Morris: nah, I dont think so. We played a weakened team vs Japan 4 yrs ago and look what happened. Plus we play our best team in 6 nations each game for most part with slight adjustments for Italy. Look at what southern hemisphere do – play their strongest team pretty much for rugby championship and some warm ups. And they win every world cup except 1. I think Murray’s article is very well put together and I would agree full strength is required. Its not equal game time for all, go games style. These are fully grown men playing professional sport so get on with it. They;; be called upon if injury strikes. Thats the idea of a squad of grown men
Gonna be an interesting call, they can probably win with a 2nd string side but agree we should put out close to our strongest . Only player I would definitely look to leave out from the 23 is Porter and keep him fresh for SA. We can bring in the likes of Baird , Henderson, Henshaw , McCloskey and Byrne (sub) and steam roll Tonga
@Owen ODonoghue: Spot on about Porter. He is the one player we cannot afford to lose to injury. Playing against SA without him would be scary.
@Owen ODonoghue: Getting hard to see Byrne in the mix, no doubt he’ll be thereabouts for this game tho.
We’re at risk of Eddie O’Sullivan 2007 territory here by playing the same team every weekend. Given the likely hard slog against Scotland and every weekend thereafter they need to rotate this weekend