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Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s second hat-trick of the season helped Everton reach the knockout stages of the Carabao Cup for the second year in a row, although the win over West Ham came at a cost to the hosts. No fewer than three players suffered strains or injuries, and in addition to Jonjoe, Kenny and Allan limping from Everton will be particularly concerned about the loss of Richarlison, their other scorer of the night.
Everton opened the scoring early on with a rare quality goal, and both its creator and runner-up showed signs of increased confidence with Carlo Ancelotti. Calmly coming out of the challenge from Manuel Lanzini at the midline, Michael Keane made a forward pass so that Calvert-Lewin was on the edge of the area.
The center forward is in the shape of his life right now but it was still surprising to see the carefree ease with which he kicked the ball out of the air with one foot before slashing a half volley that outwitted Darren Randolph with the other. . Soccer in style has barely been a trademark of Everton teams in recent seasons, and it was a shame Goodison was empty for a goal that would have brought home under normal circumstances.
Watching James Rodríguez is a pleasure in itself, and after Lanzini saw a penalty appeal rejected at one end, the Colombian nearly slipped into Richarlison at the other, only for the Brazilian to be called up by the tightest of the offside decisions after slipping the ball under Randolph. .
Séamus Coleman had to come off the bench before halftime after the unfortunate Kenny caught his cleats on the grass, before Lanzini sent a deflected header after getting into a promising position to find a cross from Aaron Cresswell.
The visitors had only registered one attempted goal in the first half, but before the second period was one minute away, they were back on terms. It was another impressive goal, this time from Robert Snodgrass, who called for the ball from Felipe Anderson and shot his left foot past Jordan Pickford’s fall from the edge of the area.
That spiced up the competition considerably, with Calvert-Lewin shooting too high and Gylfi Sigurdsson attacking Randolph before Richarlison regained Everton’s lead just before the hour. Once again, it was a well-hit shot from outside the area, though it took a slight but significant deflection from Declan Rice to leave the goalkeeper with little chance. It was Richarlison’s last contribution before he, too, sprained an ankle while attempting a tackle and gave way to Alex Iwobi.
West Ham could have leveled again when Snodgrass crossed for Andriy Yarmolenko, except the header went so far off target that it became an opportunity for Lanzini at the six-yard line, who only had Pickford to beat but threw his shot down it. wrong side. of a publication. Unbelievably, Everton then saw Allan suffer a groin strain as he tried to deal with a Rice tear down the left.
With Rice prowling the field, West Ham put Everton under some pressure before the end and was unlucky enough not to score when Sébastien Haller’s acrobatic aerial kick from an equally nimble save by Pickford, but when Iwobi scored a post to the Minutes from time all Calvert-Lewin had to do was bunt on the rebound, then the hat-trick was completed with a left foot shot from Sigurdsson’s fast six minutes from time.
