Full time thoughts – A good final game of pre-season for Everton, which saw an outstanding debut from Dwight McNeil, enough to get Frank Lampard thinking about next Saturday’s Premier League opener of the season against Chelsea here at Goodison.
90′ – The final whistle has sounded, but there is one more part to go in today’s charity match. An Everton fan has been selected to enter the field and take a penalty; Paul Stratton enters for Dele and puts him in the net for a standing ovation!
82′ – More changes, as Iwobi, Patterson, Tarkowski and Godfrey leave for Nkounkou, Warrington, Mills and Welch.
79′ – Another goal! Assist for the other debutant Vinagre, as his delicious cross into the box is headed perfectly from blank spot by McNeil, 3-0 now!
73′ – McNeil steps in and receives the ball, swings to the left and lets it fly from outside the box and curls up in the far corner! What a debut goal for the 22-year-old!! Wow, 2-0 for the Blues.
72′ – Now another rookie comes in, as we have a lot of players coming in. Salomon Rondon, Ruben Vinagre and Allan enter, and Gordon, Mykolenko and Doucoure leave.
68′ – Patterson blocks a corner cross, Tarkowski heads wide.
67′ – Dele on the ‘False 9’ is combining well with McNeil, and the Blues are certainly passing the ball much better now.
Good opportunity for Gordon when he gets into the box on the left, shoots and saves well. A minute later, he gets another chance and saves it again.
65′ – Oh, Holgate. Never too far from a mistake, right? He gives the ball directly to an opponent, but then does well to discourage Vanat from shooting.
62′ – McNeil got a round of applause when he got up to warm up, and Dele is stretching now too. Dele has changed his shirt for number 20which was announced this morning.
Quite a few changes now: MLB, Gray and Keane out, with Dele, McNeil and Holgate in. McNeil has gone immediately to the right and Dele is up. Tarks is center now with Holgate on the left.
52′ – No change for the Blues and it’s more of the same as Kyiv continues to push for a draw.
Everton are not doing a good job clearing the ball out of their box and a couple of half chances again for Kyiv.
46′ – Second half underway and the Blues almost immediately scored again! Gray’s run down the right leaves him in space for a free kick, which swirls dangerously close to goal and goalkeeper Nescheret almost hashes, giving away a corner that is cleared.
Half time thoughts We expected this to be a more competitive game, but the gloomy undertone and experimental lineup mean it’s not as good an indicator of the Blues’ preparation for the season as we would have liked.
45+1′ – Corking’s free kick from 30+ yards off Andriyevskiy heading into the top corner and an even better save from Pickford! He comes flying to hit you! The corner comes to nothing and the half-time whistle sounds, the Blues win 1-0.
40′ – The experimental midfield is being overrun here, this is a very good opportunity for Lewis Warrington to come in and take control.
39′ – Kyiv looks like Manchester City here passing the ball into the Blues’ half and Tarkowski puts out the danger again. However, the ball is unclear and eventually a long shot which Pickford easily saves.
33′ – Vanat slalom through Everton’s right, and Tarks comes across a solid challenge to stop him, and then follows the ball to hit the next man Antiukh too, delivering a corner. The Blues’ defense has certainly lost that steel.
Corner taken short, and the Blues manage to clear the danger.
30′ – The baseline of Michael Keane in the middle, Ben Godfrey on the right and James Tarkowski on the left has looked decent. However, to be fair, Kyiv doesn’t pose much of a threat either.
26′ – Kyiv wins a free kick from the opposite corner just outside the box, turns and heads clear for DCL, and then continues to charge the ball down and earn a foul as well. Good work rate from him there.
22′ – Free kick from danger zone for Kyiv, Myko is hit in the air and his man heads. The fullback is letting the event get to him, he almost got a yellow card for slipping on a Kyiv player in the other box a minute ago.
18′ – Myko’s center blocked for a corner. Mishit by Demarai Gray and slides into the area, missed by all and DCL gets a foot on him and the goalkeeper does very well to stop him!
The second corner is cleared, Blues returns the ball to the area but Tarkowski is offside.
15′ – The visitors push now when passing the ball in the middle of Everton.
10′ – Kyiv takes a corner from Everton’s right that takes it short and gets an easy header that goes wide. Jordan Pickford is quite unhappy with how indisputable all of that was.
6′ – Tarks finds Nathan Patterson who passes the ball to DCL in space, but the striker tries to do too much this time, he can’t shoot.
4′ – Everton goal! Naughty There by Dominic Calvert-Lewin! James Tarkowski has already shown his passing range, and his long ball into the box is headed by DCL running back no less, path one football paying off!
1′ – After a moment of silence in memory of all those who have lost their lives in this conflict, we get going!
Both teams are lined up in the middle of the field with Ukrainian flags around their shoulders, and we have a great atmosphere here at Goodison Park. A beautiful image now that we will send to you as soon as we can of the two teams standing together.
Vitalii Mykolenko will be the captain of an experimental team tonight. Frank Lampard has Abdoulaye Doucoure and Alex Iwobi in the middle of his usual 3-4-3 formation. There is no Yerry Mina, Tom Davies, Jean-Philippe Gbamin or Andre Gomes today and, of course, Allan is still recovering from his offseason surgery, so the midfield corps is severely weakened.
Everton
Substitutes: Crellin (GK), Lonergan (GK), Holgate, Allan, McNeil, Nkounkou, Dele, Vinagre, Rondon, Warrington, Mills, Welch.
Kyiv Dynamo
It’s been a summer with ups and downs for Everton as they close out their pre-season with a friendly against Dynamo Kyiv at Goodison Park tonight and proceeds from the game will be donated to charities to support Ukraine’s ongoing war relief efforts.
The game promises to be a particularly emotional one for Vitalii Mykolenko, who joined the Blues from the Dynamo, and the Toffees have donated a significant number of tickets to displaced Ukrainian citizens now living in the UK.
From a match perspective, Frank Lampard has one last chance to determine who is in his best XI and what formation to play them in with the start of the 22/23 Premier League season just over a week away.
Today’s opponents, the Dynamo, are a tough bunch at least, and the Ukrainian Premier League plans to start again behind closed doors next month. The league was suspended last season when the invasion began, and with Kyiv sitting in second place, they automatically made it to the Champions League Playoffs are coming up, so they will definitely take this friendly very seriously.
Competition: Pre-season friendly summer 2022 #4
Start date and time: Friday, July 29 at 11:45 a.m. PT / 2:45 p.m. ET / 7:45 p.m. BT
Stadium: goodison Park, Liverpool, EnglandUnited Kingdom
Ability: 39,572
Climate: 69°F/21°C, Mostly Cloudy, 1% chance of precipitation, 5 mph winds
TV: ESPN+ – USA; N/A – United Kingdom; DAZN, SuperSport OTT 3, SuperSport Football Plus ROA
Radio: everton-tv
Live broadcast: everton-tvDSTV Now,
game thread: Live blog above starting an hour before game time
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Information from LiveSoccerTV.com
The last time the two teams met was in a two-legged duel in the knockout rounds of the Europa League in 2015, when Everton were last in Europe. The Blues had won at home 2-1, but then Andriy Yarmolenko and his boys beat them 5-2 in Kyiv to begin the Blues’ slide to their current state.