Live Blog

Fulltime Thoughts - Everton huffed and puffed at times, but had enough quality to get the job done. Back to the Premier League now, and back to ensuring survival.

90+3’ - There’s the final whistle, Everton are through to the quarter finals of the FA Cup, a trip to Crystal Palace awaits.

90’ - Coleman fouled just outside the box. Richarlison and Townsend over it, Richy takes it and well over. Freekicks have all been poor today.
Rondon gets his head to a ball pinging about, but no power on it. There’ll be about three minutes added on.

88’ - Gordon comes off now for Lewis Dobbin. Two debutants for Everton also coming on now, youngsters Reece Welch and Isaac Price, with Allan and Keane going off. Read more about them all here.

84’ - Everton corner on the left, Gordon takes it short to Townsend, cross into the box and Rondon scores again!! 2-0 to the Blues!

82’ - Gordon continuing to be a handful on the left, fouled by the touchline.

79’ - Another Gordon shot, sails over. Everton are trying too hard to get that perfect pass into the box at times.

76’ - Richy with a shot from just outside the box, saved very well low by Ashby Hammond for a corner. Taken short, comes to Richy on the left, he cuts in and shoots, blocked for a corner on the left.
Cleared, falls to Allan outside the box and his shot is Row Z material, haha.

75’ - Lifelong Evertonian Kane Smith is coming off for the visitors, Gordon was increasingly tearing him to shreds there.

70’ - Crowd sitting up now every time Gordon gets the ball on the left. He’s lost the ball more often than he hasn’t today, but it’s definitely got the opposition worried.
GOAL! Nope! Ball deflects off Richarlison’s face, then goes off his arm into the goal, and Everton celebrate, though the ref decides that was handball and no goal. Didn’t even go to VAR though surely that was ball-to-hand and not handball, not much the Brazilian could have done about that ricochet, and the arm was tucked in too.

66’ - Gordon revitalized now, charging at the defence time and again. Plays a lovely 1-2 and sees his shot saved by the advancing goalie.

59’ - Everton have a corner on the left, played short and now Mykolenko crosses it into the box, Keane gets his header wrong, puts it over.
That will be the Ukrainian international’s last action as he looks like he’s pulled something. He’d been clattered into the hoardings by Marsh just before too. Seamus Coleman has replaced him, and Kenny has gone to the left now.

57’ - RONDON! Everton lead 1-0! Lovely cross from Jonjoe Kenny and Rondon touches it past the goalie at the near post.

54’ - The Wood goalie being warned by the ref for time-wasting.
Branthwaite passes it straight to Marsh, and he tries a shot from distance but it’s well over. That was a bad mistake.

51’ - Another chance! Doucs finds Kenny in space, delightful cross into the box and a flying Rondon meets it, but heads it over. Much more direct, three big chances in just five minutes.

48’ - Close! Gordon finds Myko down the left, and his low cross goes through the six-yard box, Rondon inches away from it.

46’ - Richarlison is on for the Blues, Patterson has come off. Straightaway Mykolenko gets to the byline and his cross looks like it’s handled, but the arm was close to the body.
The Toffees are in a straight 4-4-2 now.

Halftime Thoughts - The Blues are simply not moving the ball quickly enough to cause the visitors any real issues.

45+2’ - Mykolenko wins a corner on the left. Gordon takes, low and cleared away, and there’s the halftime whistle.

45+1’ - Quick one-two on the right and Patterson’s cross is good, but once again nowhere near any Blues.

44’ - Townsend with another left-footed inswinging cross, again a touch too high and no Blues shirts can attack it.
There’ll be two-plus minutes added on here.

40’ - There appears to be a fan in distress on the near touchline and the physios run across the pitch to attend to them.
Play finally resumes, and Boreham Wood have the ball in a dangerous spot, and Marsh chooses to shoot from a narrow angle instead of crossing, and Begovic gathers.

36’ - Doucoure concedes a foul in midfield, and Boreham are lined up outside the Everton box for the long freekick. It’s cleared after a bit of head tennis.
Now Gordon cuts in from the left and his curler dips low and the goalie parries it away.

33’ - Patterson and Townsend are doing well on the right, but the crosses aren’t right still.
Allan and Doucoure in the middle have been the Blues’ best players early on.

28’ - Everton just not moving the ball quickly enough and the Goodison crowd is getting a tad bit irritated.

23’ - Rondon wins a freekick on the right just outside the box. Townsend and Gordon over it again, Andros this time and it clears the wall but not the first defender.

20’ - Everton have had 86% of the possession so far. They’re just not getting the final pass/shot right so far.

15’ - Townsend plays in Patterson down the wing but Mendy cuts in to put it out for a corner. Taken short, Gordon jinks into the box, finds Branthwaite for a snapshot but it’s well wide again.

12’ - Rondon’s backheel finds Gordon running into space and he’s brought down. A freekick from about 25 yards out, central location. Both Gordon and Townsend over it, Gordon into the wall.
Allan finds Rondon behind the backline, his shot is saved well, but he’s offside anyway.

11’ - Allan finds Doucoure running into the right channel, his shot from a very narrow angle is wayward though.

8’ - Everton attack from a long ball, and the ball is played out to the left where Mykolenko has a low shot on goal, the goalie punches it out and Everton can’t get the rebound back on goal, and Townsend’s eventual shot is way over.

5’ - Almost a horrendous error playing the ball out of the back there for the Blues, but they recover.
Patterson on his debut start sees his low cross cut out. The Toffees are in a 3-4-3 early on.

1’ - We’re underway!
The Wood are doing the early running chasing after everything as expected.

Huge roar for Vitalii Mykolenko from the Goodison crowd, he’ll be captaining the side tonight. Classy from Kane Smith, handing Mykolenko a Boreham Wood shirt with his name on it.

There’s the carrot if Everton need it - the draw for the FA Cup quarter finals is now complete and the winners today will travel to Crystal Palace. Full draw details here.

Lineups

Frank Lampard has gone with both January fullback signings Nathan Patterson and Vitalii Mykolenko in the lineup, looks like a 3-4-3 really. The visitors play a 3-5-2, so this will match their formation, especially if Andros Townsend drops more into a #10 role in front of Allan and Abdoulaye Doucoure. The manager is clearly not taking any chances in the midfield.

Andre Gomes might be injured, not even in the squad, and neither is Demarai Gray, hopefully he hasn’t had a relapse. Richarlison and Alex Iwobi are all we have on the bench if we need some quality.

Everton

Boreham Wood

Preview

On paper, this should be a pretty straightforward task. Everton take on Boreham Wood, who are chasing promotion from the National League, which is the fifth tier of English football. However, the magic of the Cup is still well and truly alive and more than once this season smaller sides have risen up and really challenged bigger teams. Tonight’s opponents completed their own giant-killing act in the last round, beating Championship side AFC Bournemouth 1-0 and setting up a dream tie for lifelong Tony Hibbert fan Kane Smith at Goodison Park.

Between cup-tied players and injuries, Frank Lampard will have to walk the fine line of selecting a squad that can play coherent football against the battling minnows while ensuring enough players are rested up for Monday’s trip to Tottenham which will have greater implications for the season. That said, the Blues will also need to be on their guard to prevent one of the greatest upsets in a storied competition that has seen many David vs Goliath stories over the decades.

Due to a kit clash, Everton have done the sporting thing by paying for The Wood’s third kit that they will wearing tonight, and have also supported the club based on the outskirts of London with financing for the trip up north.

Match Details

Competition: FA Cup Fifth Round

Date and start time: Thursday, March 3rd at 12:15 p.m. PT / 3:15 p.m ET / 8:15 p.m. BST

Stadium: Goodison Park, Liverpool, England, United Kingdom

Capacity: 39,572

Weather: 44°F/7°C, rain, 98% chance of precipitation, 11 mph winds

How to Watch/Listen

TV: N/A - United States; ITV 1 UK, STV, UTV - United Kingdom; N/A - Canada, beIN Sports 1, SuperSport MaXimo 1, SuperSport Premier League ROA, Sony TEN 2

Radio: evertontv

Live stream: Fubo, ESPN+, Sportsnet.ca, The ITV Hub, STV Player, ESPN Play Caribbean, Sur, beIN SPORTS CONNECT, DStv Now, RUSH, Sony LIV

Gamethread: Live blog above starting about one hour before game time

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Information from LiveSoccerTV.com

Last Meeting

The two sides have never met in their history.