Everton may have failed to stop Erling Haaland from scoring his 21st goal of the Premier League season, and his 27th in all competitions, but they did prevent Manchester City from enjoying a winning end to the year.
Demarai Gray’s stunning strike midway through the second half cancelled out Haaland’s first-half goal and snatched a precious point for Frank Lampard’s team who moved up to 16th place in the standings after halting a run of four successive league defeats.
Lampard will hope this somewhat unexpected result away to the reigning champions will form a turning point for Everton’s season. It was a stop-start, foul-ridden and ill-tempered contest but equally represented a bounce back after Everton experienced a tormenting return to Premier League action on Boxing Day with a last-minute loss to Wolverhampton Wanderers.
“I think we did limit their [City’s] good chances, and in terms of our character and discipline and following through with the plan, working consistently for 100-odd minutes, understanding that’s sometimes tough and you have to stick with it, I thought we did that brilliantly and we deserved a point,” said Lampard, who saw his team score for only the 13th time in the league this term.
“It’s a big one for us because it comes off a sucker punch against Wolves. To come to the champions and get something back in a tough game is a big deal for us, albeit a point, but it’s a big deal for the dressing room.
“It’d be great to come here and open up against City and try to go toe-to-toe but they are at such a level and the position we’re in at the moment that’s not for us. I think we can be really proud of the way we approached the game.”
Lampard described Gray’s strike, only his second goal of the season, as “unstoppable”, adding: “When he hits a goal like that it just shows you the talent he’s got, and it got us a point.”
Guardiola: We did everything to win
Pep Guardiola bemoaned the loss of two points as they aim to track down leaders Arsenal who now possess a seven point lead at the top of the table. City lost their last home game before the World Cup, a 2-1 defeat to Brentford on November 12, meaning they have now dropped five points from their last two league games at the Etihad Stadium.
“They made a fantastic goal with the first shot on target they had, so we played a real real good game,” Guardiola said of the 1-1 draw. “Of course the result was not expected but that is football, it is not the first time it happened. We did everything to win. They played really well.
“Afterwards they broke a bit the rhythm because the referees were not ready [due to technical issues] but, in general, we did everything and unfortunately could not win.”
Guardiola’s only real gripe was over a perceived lack of consistency from referee Andy Madley. The City manager claimed he had no issue with Haaland’s booking for a rash tackle on Vitaliy Mykolenko and revealed he needed to tell the Norwegian, who was fired up after an early clash with Ben Godfrey, to calm down.
However, the Spaniard was irked that rough challenges on his players were not similarly punished. Guardiola said: “It’s a yellow card for Erling, definitely. I said, ‘Be careful, it is an action, it can be dangerous – we cannot play 10 against 11’. I know what had happened – he was a bit angry from the first action on his ankle.
“But Jack Grealish was three or four times down, nothing happened, and the first action [from Haaland] was a yellow card.” Asked if he was complaining his players were not getting enough protection, Guardiola said: “No, no, no.”
