And delighted David Moyes believes the fourth place his side currently occupies is merited by the performances his players have produced all season.
“The position doesn’t shame the way Everton have been playing or the way the players have been playing. It doesn’t shame them at all,” he declared.
“They have been playing that well.
“But you know we could quite easily have slipped down and before we know it we could have been in the bottom half of the league.
“The Premier League is so tight, but it feels good today and we have to make sure we maintain that.
“A game like that can lift you, it shows the belief and persistence we have to keep going and the players showed great character.”
After a promising first half Everton saw the influential Kevin Mirallas come off at half-time with a tight hamstring and then fall behind to a cruelly deflected Clint Dempsey strike just 15 minutes from time. But goals in time added on by Steven Pienaar and Nikica Jelavic turned the game on its head.
“It had got a bit scrappy and it was possibly our poorest part of the game in that last 10 minutes when we were trying to make changes,” explained Moyes.
“We were trying to push Bainesy wider, we were trying to push Steven Naismith in the middle, we were trying to go three at the back with Gibbo coming to get on the ball and make passes from there, we had tried everything to try and give ourselves an opening but we kept at it and got it in the end.”
Seamus Coleman delivered the cross for Pienaar’s equaliser and the Blues boss added:
“I thought Seamus looked great today, the ‘but’ to that is that I thought he had three or four better positions in the first half when he didn’t deliver.
“And I’ve seen the equaliser again and I’m not convinced he was trying to pick Steven Pienaar out!
“But it is a ball which gives us a chance of scoring a goal and Steven Pienaar’s header was terrific from 13 or 14 yards out.”
Source: liverpool_echo
