Live Blog

Don’t forget to go grade the Everton players and manager here.

Fulltime Thoughts - Not going to lie, drove me insane to see Everton park the bus as they did after scoring, but when your busdriver is Carlo Ancelotti, you just have to keep the faith.

Premier League

90+6’ - Tick tock the clock goes. FULL TIME!! THREE POINTS!!

90+4’ - Skin of the teeth stuff here. Gomes wins a foul and goes down easily, to let the clock tick down some more.

90+2’ - Vardy skins Keane and cuts it back, Perez shoots, blocked by Holgate for a corner that is cleared well.

90’ - It’s going to be six minutes added on. Six. Where from, who knows?

86’ - Chilwell leaves Gomes for dead and tries to cross, goes off Coleman’s arm, No penalty, the captain’s arm was tucked in pretty tight to the body, but a relief not to see it given.

83’ - Gray steams in behind Digne, his cutback eventually falls to Maddison outside the box and he curls his shot high and wide. Relief, for the next few seconds at least.

78’ - Gordon goes off for Bernard, he’s played really well the kiddo.
Foxes making another double-sub, Damari Gray and Ayoze Perez on for Tielemans and Albrighton.. that’s four forwards on the pitch now not counting Maddison.

74’ - Pickford now goes in the book for timewasting.
Gomes shoved off the ball twice in quick succession, moving about aimlessly, it’s like he has no idea how to play when Everton do not have the ball.

67’ - Second half cooling break, and Ancelotti has now gone full conservative, Yerry Mina is on for Iwobi. This is just inviting more pressure. Going to be more of a 5-4-1 now I think. Commentator clears that up, it’s a 5-3-1-1 with Gordon behind DCL.

65’ - Pickford has lost his mind. Drops a ball into the box, and it comes to Iheanacho, who with an open goal fires over. Shambles in the Everton box right now.

62’ - OH MY WORD! Pickford makes an utter hash of a ball into the box, goes through his gloves and off Keane... rolls towards the line and Keane clears!! Maybe 75% of the ball was over the line there, yikes.
It’s been all Leicester this second half, and Maddison has been inspirational for them, and Iheanacho’s energy is making the difference too. Meanwhile Everton have no response.

57’ - Yes, Richarlison goes off and Davies is on, likely to disrupt the possession Leicester are enjoying right now.

54’ - Richarlison nips the ball ahead of Ndidi and is hacked down, yellow card for the Leicester man. Tom Davies is quickly ready, and will come on if the Brazilian cannot continue.

51’ - Iheanacho makes an immediate difference and it’s 2-1 now. Ball lofted into the box, Vardy gets a touch, and it falls between Keane and Holgate, and the Nigerian striker prods home past Pickford.

49’ - DCL controls well, his shot is blocked, rebound falls to Digne who fires away from distance, it’s deflected and clawed away for a corner by Schmeichel! The corner is cleared though.

46’ - Kelechi Iheanacho and James Maddison now on with Dennis Praet and Harvey Barnes off, they’ve gone 4-4-2 to match the Blues.

Halftime Thoughts - Carlo Ancelotti knows the limitations of his squad, and has the boys playing within themselves. Defensive workrate has been excellent in the face of mounting pressure from the visitors, and two well-taken goals are the difference at the break.

Premier League

45+3’ - Everton use an excellent three-minute spell of possession to close out the half and go into the dressing rooms at 2-0 at the break.

41’ - Not going to lie, Everton will be relieved to get to half time with the score as it is. Leicester are clearly on top and showing all the right attacking initiative, the Toffees have been at full stretch keeping things clean in their own half.

36’ - Richarlison brings down Ndidi about where Digne took his freekick from, Keane clears twice in the air before the Foxes are repelled.
A corner is partly cleared and Tielemans fires off a terrific volley that is blocked well by Keane, and then a rebound falls to Evans clear on goal and Pickford dives at his feet to block. Whew.

33’ - DCL and Iwobi engineer a break before the Nigerian rushes his pass back to the striker and it’s cleared for a corner. Digne’s inswinger is deep and Keane heads over.

30’ - It’s not really pretty football right now with Everton continuing to allow the Foxes all of the ball, just staying back and looking to use the long ball to DCL for the counter attack.

25’ - Cooling break now, and Brendan Rodgers is looking pretty tense as he talks to his players.

22’ - As expected, it’s been all Leicester since the two quick goals, with Everton happy to keep all the play in front of them.
Now Dominic Calvert-Lewin makes a good run and is almost through on goal, Soyuncu barges into him shoulder-on-shoulder and DCL goes flying. Clearly no penalty there.

15’ - Sigurdsson steps up, and sends Schmeichel the wrong way, cool as you like.. 2-0 Everton! Wow, what a start this has been.

12’ - Richarlison has won a freekick in the left channel. Swung in by Lucas Digne and it goes off Wilfried Ndidi’s arm! The Everton players are up in arms, and it takes a long, long VAR review before Craig Pawson points to the spot.
Funny how the Premier League had tweeted this just before this game.

9’ - GOAL! Everton take the lead! Gordon makes a good run down the wing, and his low cross is met with a bang by Richarlison, and it almost takes off Schmeichel’s head off on the way in!!

6’ - Leicester are finding it easy to get the ball back from Everton who are having to resort to longer balls down the wings. And when in possession, the Blues are not pressing as a team, which is allowing Leicester to move upfield without difficulty.

2’ - Everton are running around pressing the Foxes, who pass right through the middle and Youri Tielemans almost finds Vardy but Jordan Pickford is quick off his line to gather it in.

1’ - And we’re off, Jamie Vardy gets us underway after all the players take a knee.

Lineups - Two changes as Sigurdsson and Gordon are in for Davies and Bernard.

Preview

With just a few games left in the 2019-20 campaign, Everton are looking to make a move up the Premier League table and seal Europa League qualification. The midtable logjam they find themselves in is packed pretty heavily though and the Blues will need to get some wins under their belts if they stand any chance of climbing up to at least eighth.

Two straight clean sheets, against the top and bottom sides in the league, have Evertonians believing again and Carlo Ancelotti has shown he is not against winning ugly to get the points while he waits for reinforcements, from the physio’s table and the transfer market.

Leicester City are having an excellent season, in some respects better than the year when they somehow won the Premier League title as 5,000 to 1 outsiders. Brendan Rodgers has a deep squad that embodies the kind of football he is looking to play, which has developed more finesse than simply Jamie Vardy haring after long balls hoofed upfield. The Foxes defence is the second best in the league, and a big reason why they sit in third place now.

Match Details

Competition: Premier League Matchday 32

Date and start time: Wednesday, July 1st at 10:00 a.m. PT / 1:00 p.m ET / 6:00 p.m. BST

Stadium: Goodison Park, Liverpool, England, United Kingdom

Capacity: 39,572

Weather: 63°F/17°C, mostly cloudy, 13% chance of precipitation, 9 mph winds

How to Watch/Listen

TV: N/A - United States; Sky Sports Action, Sky Sports Main Event - United Kingdom; DAZN - Canada, beIN Sports HD 2, SuperSport 5 Africa, RMC Sport 2

Radio: evertontv, Talksport 2 Radio UK, BBC Radio

Live stream: NBC Sports Gold App, Peacock, Sky Ultra HD, SKY GO Extra, ESPN Play Sur, beIN SPORTS CONNECT, DStv Now, RUSH

Gamethread: Live blog above starting one hour before game time

*Royal Blue Mersey has affiliate partnerships and may earn commissions for products purchased via affiliate links provided.

Information from LiveSoccerTV.com

Lineups

Everton

Starting XI: Pickford, Coleman, Holgate, Keane, Digne, Iwobi, Gomes, Sigurdsson, Gordon, Richarlison, Calvert-Lewin

Subs: Stekelenburg, Virginia, Baines, Mina, Branthwaite, Beningime, Davies, Bernard, Kean

Leicester City

Starting XI: Schmeichel, Chilwell, Soyuncu, Evans, Justin, Ndidi, Barnes, Praet, Tielemans, Albrighton, Vardy

Subs: Ward, Morgan, Gray, Perez, Iheanacho, Choudhury, Mendy, Fuchs, Maddison

Last Meeting

The Blues last met the Foxes in December at Goodison in the League Cup quarterfinals, and with Everton’s miserable record in that competition it was to no one’s surprise that the hosts went behind by two and it all looked over. But Tom Davies pulled one back and then a thunderbolt from the past by veteran Leighton Baines tied it with just minutes to go. However, the game went into a penalty shootout and the heartbreak continued for the Toffees.