Everton 4 - Crystal Palace 0

Let’s start in the style of Sesame Street. Today’s lesson was brought to you by the letters J and V, and the number 4.

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The first win for Everton in the 4th month of 2005

Everton wins by 4 clear goals to Crystal Palace

We are 4 points in front of the RedShite

The Toffees still 4th in the table

Once a Blue, 4-ever a Blue.
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Everton took full advantage of the fact that fourth place obsessed, but patently not good enough, Liverpool lost again yesterday, thanks to a last minute goal from Kiki Musampa. With the game being a day later than their rivals’ yesterday’s results set things up nicely for Everton.

Knowing a win would put them four points clear again, they went at Palace with gusto, in a slighly changed 4-4-2 formation. Gary Naysmith came in, suprisingly for the Italian, with Hibbert, Stubbs and Weir completing the defensive line-up. In midfield, Arteta took his place, alongside Osman, Kilbane and Cahill. Up front, Ferguson partnered Marcus Bent. The man making way for Ferguson was Lee Carsley who found himself on the bench, alongside Watson, Wright, Vaughan and McFadden.

With the change in formation offering a little more in the way of creativity, it didn’t take Everton long to test Crystal Palace. Kilbane trying one from long range that just missed. However, the goal that Everton craved came after 8 minutes. Palace’s goalkeeper, Gabor Kiraly handling outside his area and Mikel Arteta stepped up to send the ball screaming into the top right hand corner for his first goal for the club.



An early goal was what was needed in order to settle the nerves of Evertonians on and off the pitch, but the game didn’t really light up to be anything special in the first half. Ferguson forced an excellent save out of Kiraly, and Osman should have scored, but headed over when well placed, and that was really it as far as Evertonian highlights are concerned. Palace had a couple of snapshots.

Everton went into the break 1-0 up, and reasonably comfortable. Alan Stubbs was forced to leave the field of play after 26 minutes after injuring his arm. He was replaced by the versatile Steve Watson.

The second half took off in great fashion when Tim Cahill slammed home the second goal from 18 yards, and ten minutes later headed the third, following good work from Kevin Kilbane to all bit kill the game. Palace could have pulled a goal back, but Torghelle was unlucky to see his shot come back off the post, and Wayne Routledge should have done better than put the ball wide when well placed.







With fifteen minutes left, James Vaughan was called by David Moyes to replace Gary Naysmith. James Vaughan aged 16 years and 271 days made a piece of Everton history, becoming the youngest ever Everton first team player, beating Joe Royle’s long-standing record.

He certainly was keen to get involved in the action and had a shot blocked as the blues pressed again. However, with four minutes of normal time remaining, Osman and Kilbane linked up, and when Kilbane put a cross into the Palace penalty area, there was the youngster, Vaughan to divert the ball past Kiraly and into the net for Everton’s fourth goal of the afternoon.





In that moment, he broke two more records, taking his afternoon tally to four. He beat Wayne Rooney’s record as the youngest ever Everton goalscorer, and he also broke James Milner’s record as the youngest goalscorer in the history of the Premiership.

So, Everton score four goals, to win four-nil, and that fits perfectly into the Sesame Street tie-in up top.

The official match report Everton 4 - Crystal Palace 0