Everton 2 -1 Fulham

A last-minute penalty from Mikel Arteta spared Everton from what would have been a wholly disappointing home draw against an under-strength Fulham side, as Roy Hodgson made nine changes from the team that picked up a 0-0 draw away to Hamburg last Thursday.

David Moyes rewarded Yakubu Aiyegbeni for his impressive substitute performance at Blackburn last weekend by starting him ahead of top-scorer Louis Saha. Saha hasn’t found the net since his stunning brace against Chelsea a few months ago, so it seems inevitable that people will soon start claiming that he’s stopped trying since signing a lucrative contract back in January.

Really though, Saha has always spent much of his time in a blue shirt strolling around, waiting for a chance to drop. When they do he is capable of scoring absolute screamers, but when they don’t he looks like one idle bastard.

Speaking of idle bastards, Diniyar Bilyaletdinov was dragged off at half-time after failing to impress the manager with his first-half display. He was no worse than usual – and certainly not as bad as at Ewood Park last week – but after Victor Anichebe’s positive performance I wouldn’t expect to see much of the Russian in the remaining two fixtures.

In fairness to Bilyaletdinov he did hit the post with a cracking first-time volley and it probably doesn’t help that half the ground groans before he even has a chance to lose possession. Whether or not you think the excuses about him playing without a summer break are valid, it’s still worth giving him more time to settle in to Europe’s most unforgiving league. I’m just clinging on to the fact that players as good as Robert Pires and Florent Malouda looked as bad as Bilyaletdinov has in their debut seasons.

Fulham took a first-half lead after a woeful back pass from Leighton Baines put Erik Nevland one on one with Tim Howard, leaving the striker with a relatively easy finish. It seems harsh to criticise Baines too much at the end of a season where he’s been forced to play in pretty much every game and has still managed to avoid any real dips in form, but it was still a terrible error. Hopefully, for his sake, Fabio Capello won’t hold it against him when picking his World Cup squad in a few weeks.

Everton started the second-half brightly and the equaliser soon came when Steven Pienaar and Arteta combined beautifully down the left hand side before the Spaniard floated a cross which was met by substitute Anichebe. The striker’s header deflected off the head of Chris Smalling and was quite harshly given as the Fulham defender’s own goal as it crept past Mark Schwarzer into the Park End net.

From there Everton pressed hard for a winner and came close on a few occasions, with Tim Cahill heading straight at Schwarzer from a corner and substitute Saha putting a header of his own in to the side netting when he really should have scored. Fulham created a few chances of their own on the break, the best of which fell to Stefano Okaka (a big grock they’ve loaned from Roma) after a fantastic pass from the impressive Clint Dempsey sent Nevland clear of the perennially wrong-side Sylvan Distin. Luckily Nevland opted to cut the ball back to Carlton Cole clone Okaka, who fired a poor effort straight at Tim Howard.

Just as we were all ready to start grumbling about drawing at home with Fulham reserves, Everton were given a golden opportunity to take all three points as the referee (I can’t remember who it was, they’re all equally shie) awarded the home side a rather dubious penalty.

Our good fortune began when Saha’s poor first touch knocked the ball out of play, only for the linesman to inexplicably give the throw-in Everton’s way. This led to a bit of head tennis in the Fulham area before one of their defenders appeared to kick Cahill in the chest while attempting to clear the ball. Cahill went down like he’d been shot and a spot-kick was given. Arteta sent Schwarzer the wrong way, securing the points in the 94th minute with pretty much the last kick of the game.

So Everton’s superb post-Christmas form continues, which is certainly something to be happy about, even if it was a bit of an underwhelming performance against a weakened side. It seems very unlikely that we’ll manage to qualify for next season’s Europa League, but I suppose that could end up being a blessing as long as the player exodus hinted by Tim Cahill earlier in the week doesn’t take place