Everton Secures Opening Day Victory Against Crystal Palace
Andy Burnham took his place among the plush seats at Hill Dickinson Stadium, eyes fixed on the team he has followed all his life and the transfer saga that has dominated their summer. No right‑back. No new centre‑forward. Plenty of noise, even the Prime Minister weighing in. On the pitch, though, Everton cut through the chatter with something far more persuasive: a controlled, clinical 2-0 win over a wasteful Crystal Palace.
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, carrying the weight of last season’s bruised ending on his shoulders, ripped it off with one swing of his left boot. Thierno Barry, a forward whose future has been debated almost daily as Everton chase another striker, then nodded in the second after the break. David Moyes’s side did not just survive their supposed shortcomings. They used them as a backdrop to a statement opening-day victory.
Palace's Introduction
For Pierre Sage, this was a harsh Premier League introduction. No sweeping tactical revolution, no wild selection gambles. Palace under their new manager looked a lot like Palace under Oliver Glasner: well structured, neat in possession, and alarmingly blunt when it mattered. They carved out three clear chances before Everton scored. They took none. And when Chadi Riad went down late on with what looked a serious injury, the afternoon darkened further.
Palace’s build-up to kick-off had already been clouded by noise around Ismaïla Sarr. Reports claimed the Senegal forward had refused to play to force a move to Galatasaray. The club pushed back, Sage insisting Sarr was injured. Whatever the truth, Palace began as if untouched by the drama.
Within three minutes, Everton’s new captain James Tarkowski misjudged a header and Palace pounced. Eddie Nketiah streaked away down the left and slid the ball across for Jean-Philippe Mateta, darting to the near post. The finish should have matched the movement. Instead, Mateta lashed his volley over from close range and Everton escaped.
The warning did not jolt the hosts awake. Palace kept coming. Adam Wharton, whose name has already been linked with Manchester City and whose manager has flatly refused to entertain a sale, picked up the ball in midfield and measured a gorgeous pass over Merlin Röhl. The young German, pressed into emergency duty at right-back with Everton’s search for Seamus Coleman’s successor drifting into farce, was caught. Nketiah took the ball in stride, had time to pick his spot, and drove low towards the far corner. Jordan Pickford flung out a left hand, diverted it onto the post and watched the ball spin away.
The same upright shook again soon after. Wharton, Dwight McNeil and Nketiah sliced Everton open with a swift exchange of passes, leaving Mateta free in front of goal. At full stretch, the France international finally beat Pickford, only for the woodwork to intervene again. Palace’s bench sank back into their seats. The away end groaned. On the home side, a different feeling began to grow. Survive that kind of storm and belief tends to follow.
Everton’s response was gradual rather than explosive. The new faces began to knit the game together. Hayden Hackney showed for the ball, Tyrique George probed down the left, Röhl settled after his early scare. The first real opening for Moyes’s team came when Dewsbury-Hall slipped a clever pass into Röhl’s path. The midfielder looked up and squared for Iliman Ndiaye, whose low effort forced Dean Henderson into a sharp stop.
For a while, that was as good as it got. Everton’s attacking play stuttered, George’s energy not quite matched by end product, Ndiaye drifting on the fringes. The contest sat in that awkward middle ground: Palace dangerous on the break, Everton tidy but blunt. Then Dewsbury-Hall decided he had seen enough.
The midfielder suddenly came alive. He drove at the Palace back line, weaving through challenges before his shot cannoned off Chris Richards. Everton appealed for handball. Nothing doing. Palace broke through Daniel Muñoz, a player Everton have considered as a solution to their right-back problem. He did not get far. Harrison Armstrong hunted him down, stripped him of the ball and left space gaping on that side.
Armstrong rolled the ball into Dewsbury-Hall, still on the move, still sensing the moment. From the left of the area he wrapped his left foot around an angled drive that flew past Henderson and into the far corner. Unstoppable. Hill Dickinson erupted, and with it, the tension of a summer’s angst eased in an instant.
Palace had their chances to respond. Muñoz almost made up for his error when he ghosted in front of George to meet a fine cross from Daichi Kamada. Again the build-up was sharp, the delivery on point. Again the finish went missing, the Colombian’s header drifting wide of the far post.
By then, the pattern was set. Palace rued what might have been. Everton, hardened by last season’s scars and stripped of the signings many said they needed, simply cashed in.
