Everton 0-2 Nottingham Forest
by James Nalton
at Goodison Park

ARSENAL, Chelsea and Manchester City have all failed to defeat Everton in the previous three games but Nottingham Forest showed why they deserve to be second in the Premier League at the end of the weekend with a convincing 2-0 win at Goodison Park.

Chris Wood has a case to be considered the best striker in the Premier League and added an 11th goal of the season this afternoon, lifting the ball over Jordan Pickford to open the scoring.

Wood made 165 appearances under Sean Dyche when both were at Burnley, scoring 53 goals. How the Everton boss must wish he had a player of the New Zealander’s ilk at his disposal now.

Morgan Gibbs-White had dropped deep from his No 10 position to set up the goal, playing a long pass forward before a headed one-two between Wood and Anthony Elanga set up the former.

In an attempt to make something happen in Everton’s attack, Dyche tried something different up front, giving Armando Broja his first start for the club.

Two other centre-forwards, Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Beto, were both on the Everton bench having themselves tried at various points this season to give the team a focal point in attack.

Calvert-Lewin has scored just twice in the league this season, and the barely used Beto only once.

Broja looked lively but the service to him was minimal and poor. A couple of crosses in his direction from Vitalii Mykolenko presented awkward headed chances that both went off target.

One one occasion the striker on loan from Chelsea created some space but his well-hit left-footed effort cruised wide.

Too much of Everton’s attacking was hit and hope. Whether long balls forward, scrappy one-twos, or aimless crosses into the box, there appeared to be no deliberate or thought-out attacking play.

Forest were the complete opposite. You couldn’t imagine an Everton player hitting the kind of pass Gibbs-White made from deep for Forest’s first goal, for example.

The chance that led to the visitors’ second was gifted to them by Everton when Abdoulaye Doucoure’s under-hit pass caught Mykolenko sleeping, but it still needed scoring.

Elanga intercepted and found Wood who fed Gibbs-White. The Forest captain turned inside Doucoure and finished coolly.

The invention in deep areas combined with clinical chance-creation and finishing showed why Forest are where they are in the table.

It’s no fluke. These players are each outstanding in their individual roles, but the team are also working as a unit.

Even a late pre-kick-off change to the shape from 3-4-3 to 4-2-3-1, forced by an injury to Murillo in the warm-up, didn’t unsettle manager Nuno Espirito Santo and his team.

Iliman Ndiaye was a bright spark as always for Everton but Forest right-back Ola Aina did well against the tricky winger.

Aina is another player, one of many at Forest, who has been among the standout players in his position this season.

A couple of late Pickford saves prevented the score from being worse from an Everton perspective, while Forest fans sang “We’re gonna win the league.”