There were scenes of jubilation at Goodison Park on Wednesday night, and that was just the reaction to Steven Gerrard being substituted in the 12th minute. Later on in the evening, Dan Gosling grabbed the winner deep into extra-time, thus ensuring that Everton would be playing Aston Villa in the next round. Didn’t they do well?
Setanta reports that while David Moyes is trying to keep it real, telling his players that it’s just one victory and that there’s a stack of work to be done yet, the Scot couldn’t resist having a poke at Everton’s neighbours. After all, Rafael Benitez has been pretty derogatory about the Toffees in the past, going as far as to describe them as a small club. It appears as though Moyes has had the last laugh though.
“Rightly so, they should [be celebrating],” he added. “But we don’t win the Cup for that, we get into the next round.
“But when you play your local rivals – and let’s be fair, they are a really good team – and they have talked a lot about what they are going to to do. And I think they must have said however many times that they were going to beat us, so sometimes what goes around comes around and tonight it’s our turn.”
Before the match, the Everton manager had spoken out about ‘bigger clubs’ like Liverpool having the decisions go their way. It must have therefore delighted Moyes to see Lucas Leiva rightly sent off for two bookable challenges, something which irked Rafael Benitez as a result. Perhaps the Reds will be more modest next time they line up for a Merseyside derby, with their opponents proving to now be one of the strongest teams in the country.