West Ham could easily have come out of the game on Saturday with nothing.
Everton, despite their man disadvantage, were two up with 15 minutes to play. Lukaku missed a penalty, and had further chances to extend their lead before West Ham started their comeback and they must see the result as three points dropped.
However, statistically, West Ham were the better team in pretty much every aspect of the match.
According to FourFourTwo’s Statszone, West Ham enjoyed 58.5 percent of the ball on Saturday. It could be argued that this is to be expected when the opposition is down to 10 men, but Martinez fancies his side as a footballing team and would expect them to have far more of the ball than that, 10 men or not. West Ham had 15 shots to Everton’s 13, and created more chances than the Home team. West Ham actually doubled Everton’s chances created with 14 to Everton’s 7, 11 of those being from open play as well.
Payet and Lanzini, whilst not being as effective as usual for the opening 75 minutes, showed their blossoming partnership with the two highest pass combinations in the match being between the two of them. Lanzini gave the ball to Payet 24 times over the 90 minutes, with Payet giving it to Lanzini 17 times.
In fact, West Ham actually made 414 passes to Everton’s 268. This shows the effect Bilic has had on this team. At 2-0 down in previous seasons, with Sakho and Carroll on the pitch, the team would go route one and sacrifice the ball, whereas Bilic encourages his team to play and use the strikers later in an attacking move, rather than hoofing it from the back. It means the strikers are isolated feeding on scraps, but are in the right areas with players around them to feed off. This is exactly what happened for the equaliser and then subsequently for the winner.
Adrian made 6 saves against Everton, but it’s unlikely that his saves have ever made more of an impact on a match before. The penalty and Lukaku’s one on one chance were the turning point in this match, momentum swung our way after that and there is no doubt whatsoever that we would of been heading back to East London with nothing if the keeper hadn’t been on top of his game. In terms of saves made by Premier League keepers this season, Adrian is 5th with 80. Jack Butland is leading the way with 92 saves.
Another stat on Adrian is his penalty record. Since the Spaniard joined the Premier League he has double as many penalty saves as the next best keeper. Adrian has saved 4 penalties, no other keeper has managed more than 2. He has also scored more penalties in that time (1), coincidentally also against Everton.
Before the match, West Ham had failed to beat Everton in 15 league outings, dating back to a 1-0 win at The Boleyn Ground in 2007. Bobby Zamora got the winner. The last time we beat Everton at Goodison Park was in December 2005, over 10 years ago. A David Weir own goal and another Zamora winner in a 1-2 victory for the Irons. Richard Wright played in goal for Everton that day, a couple of seasons before joining West Ham (despite not making any league appearances). The West Ham team featured James Collins, who is the only member of the squad that is still playing for the club. Mark Noble wasn’t in the matchday squad for the Everton game, and only made 5 appearances in that season.
