Sean Dyche missed Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Beto opportunity in Everton win at Aston Villa
Sean Dyche had a nearly flawless evening as Everton impressively defeated Aston Villa 2-1 on Wednesday (27 September) to book their spot in the fourth round of the EFL Cup.
The Toffees made it back-to-back victories as James Garner and Dominic Calvert-Lewin were on target at Villa Park, with Boubacar Kamara’s 83rd-minute effort not enough to spark a revival from the home side.
There was one opportunity that the Toffees’ boss missed, though, involving the use of his strikers Calvert-Lewin and Beto.
Dyche cleverly used his thin squad to good effect, switching to a back five to rest some of his regulars, and opting to have debutant Jack Harrison and Arnaut Danjuma as the supporting forwards to lone striker Calvert-Lewin.
Speaking after the game, in quotes reported by the Liverpool Echo (28 September), Dyche conceded he had pondered going with two strikers against the Villans.
“My staff have done brilliantly as well because they were thinking about this formation and ‘should we, shouldn’t we’, because we were also looking at playing the two strikers,” he said.
“So you take the risk and the reward scenario of changing it over a two-day period and getting a very good performance and a very good win, so that is pleasing from the staff and player point of view.”
There is certainly no bashing Dyche, especially given Everton earned another good win that will give them confidence going forward.
But there is a feeling that this fixture would have provided a good opportunity to see how Calvert-Lewin and summer signing Beto would fare as a duo playing together.
It wouldn’t have even necessarily have to have been as part of the starting line-up. It was Beto who replaced Calvert-Lewin in the 72nd minute, perhaps it would have made sense for the Portuguese striker to have entered the fray a little earlier and had some minutes playing alongside Calvert-Lewin.
Calvert-Lewin himself recently spoke to Everton’s official website (25 September) to hint that he would like to play alongside Beto.
“He’s a physical presence and I’ve really enjoyed training with him. We’ve had a few conversations between ourselves about us being on the pitch at the same time and how that will look, and how we can make that work,” Calvert-Lewin said.
“It’s been a while since I’ve had someone as physical as myself to be up there at the top of the pitch and to share the workload. A lot of the time, I’ve had to be a battering ram and that sometimes takes away from other parts of your game.”
It feels like this is a combination that Dyche will try out at some point and ultimately he got the win against Villa. It just would have been nice to see Calvert-Lewin and Beto get some time together, wouldn’t it?
In other Everton news, there has been a team news update ahead of the Luton fixture with four players set to miss out.