Ademola Lookman marked his Everton debut with a goal as they dismembered Kelechi Iheanacho’s Manchester City 4-0 at Goodison Park on Sunday.
Goals from Romelu Lukaku, Kevin Mirallas and Tom Davis and Lookman saw the Tofees puncture Pep Guardiola’s title ambitions, just as Ronald Koeman had promised before the game.
Everton and Manchester City didn’t disappoint with the way they started this game, Ronald Koeman and Pep Guardiola obviously putting friendship to one side as their respective teams slugged it out on the pitch.
The early exchanges were good, as Kevin Mirallas received a good pass in a dangerous area in the first minute, but the City defence was alert to snuff out the danger, and just minutes later Lukaku was almost at the end of a through pass, which was again intercepted by City’s alert defence.
The Mancunians were not without their own early chances, as Raheem Sterling wriggled his way past some markers into the Everton box, but goalkeeper Joel Robles was quick and alive to his responsibilities.
It was a nice exchange between both teams, the Tofees showing no fear and City also showing signs of defensive improvements, but all that would change midway into the half and almost towards the half time mark.
Mirallas found Lukaku with a neat pass, and the Belgian striker collected the ball and unleashed a terrific shot from the edge of the box, his effort finding the bottom right corner to give Everton the lead. What a nice goal that was.
Four minutes later, Sterling had another chance, this time going close for City, but his effort missed the target by a whisker, and that would be the last major event of the half, as Everton went into the break with the lead.
While the start to the first period was okay, the start to this second period was something else, as within two minutes of the restart, Everton were doubling their lead.
The impressive Mirallas took a great first touch to control a fantastic pass on the edge of the City box, drilled a shot into the bottom left corner of City’s goal, as Everton celebrate yet again, they are two-nil up at this point.
While City hadn’t been particularly bad, but Everton had been markedly better at this stage, and were showing no signs of letting up, or letting Guardiola’s men back into the game. Former Everton defender John Stones then went close, but his header was superbly saved by Robles, just when the 22-year old thought he had scored against his old club.
The Tofees were clearly in control, and City were finding it difficult to break them down, and just when you would think they would soft-pedal and try to protect their two-goal lead, they scored another. Davis received a neat pass from inside the box and saw that Claudio Bravo was outside of his line, the youngster then lobbed the ball over the City goalkeeper for Everton’s third. What a goal that was!
Sergio Aguero did go close almost immediately for City, but it wasn’t to be as the impressive Robles made another important save.
However, new signing Lookman came off the bench to score on his debut to make it 4-0.
Tried as they did, City couldn’t get what would have only been a consolation.
