Everton have today taken advantage of Chelsea’s poor start as they added another defeat to Chelsea’s 2015/16 season record. A big part of this was down to Steven Naismith. But just how good was he?
The day didn’t start off the the way Steven Naismith would’ve hoped for as Roberto Martinez initially decided to leave the Scottish international out of his starting eleven. His fortunes soon changed at the expense of Muhammad Besic, whose game was cut short due to an injury in the 9th minute.
Roberto Martinez should be given credit for the change as he could’ve opted for the more glamorous choices of Mirallas, Deulofeu, he could’ve handed Aaron Lennon an early second debut. Instead he gave Naismith the nod, and it’s a good job he did.
Steven Naismith comes on for the injured Besic.
Just 7 minutes after Naismith stepped onto the Goodison turf he netted his first goal of the game. After an impressive 16-pass move which ended with the Everton man heading the ball into the top right hand corner from a Brendan Galloway cross.
The Goodison faithful then got the feeling that the Toffees could take away all three points. Their feelings were strengthened when Naismith grabbed his second with a fine left footed strike into the bottom corner of Asmir Begovic’s net, the Bosnian was standing in for the injured Thibaut Courtois.
Everton seemed comfortable with the game heading to half-time when out of nowhere Nemanja Matic let fly from a distance with a fantastic strike to pull a goal back for the away team.
Everton then looked to have decided to sit back and take their chances as the game entered its closing stages, which as we know from past experience isn’t the best idea. The Blues then got a break lead by Ross Barkley who released a well timed through ball to Steven Naismith who still had work to do from a tight angle but managed to finish the Londoners off with a perfect hat-trick.
Steven Naismith celebrates with new boy Lennon.
Everton now sit in 5th after 5 games played and Martinez has some selection problems for the game against Swansea next weekend after Naismith’s heroics, but they are not the type of problems that managers lose sleep over.
