Moyes happy with Everton fight

Everton manager David Moyes was pleased with his side’s performance after they beat Fulham 2-1 at Goodison Park on Saturday.

Goals to Seamus Coleman and Louis Saha gave the Toffees a two-goal lead, and although Clint Dempsey pulled a goal back for Fulham in the second half and created some nervous moments towards the end, Everton held on and climbed to eighth with their victory.

“We let them back into the game, we got 2-0 up and I don’t know if we came off the gas or ran out of a little bit of energy in that part of the game or if Fulham actually upped it,” Moyes told ESPN after the match.

“When they got the goal it was tough – they had a lot of the ball and we had to dig in but with the players we’ve got out we had to grind a result out today and we knew that was going to be the situation and the players have done that.”

Moyes reserved special praise for Irish winger Coleman, who has impressed at Merseyside this season.

“Seamus (was) great today for us, he’s been a little bit up and down recently but he got a goal and he’s created one or two other things for us,” he said.

“He’s a young boy as far as football terms go, he’s not long out of the Irish league and it’s his first full season in the Premier League so I think we’ve got to give him a lot of credit for how well he’s doing just now.”

Moyes also said he was not sure of the severity of Louis Saha’s knock, which appeared to be to his ankle, but said his substitution was for tactical reasons and nothing to do with his injury.

Fulham manager Mark Hughes bemoaned his side’s first-half performance, insisting that the poor start had cost them a chance of winning the match but was pleased with their fightback although it amounted to nothing.

“We gave ourselves too much to do,” Hughes said.

“The manner of our first-half performance was too passive and Everton were allowed to dictate the game to us. If you don’t start in the way you mean to go on then you can find yourself in a situation where you’re behind in the game.”

“At 2-0 down it’s a mountain to climb but we came back and showed a good response. In the second half we engaged with them a lot more aggressively and stopped things at (their) sources which helped us. We created a number of chances that, on another day, might have gone in for us.”

“Unfortunately it wasn’t to be and we ran out of time.”