Roy Hodgson rages as he reveals incident on Everton bench in Crystal Palace loss
Roy Hodgson has been left in a rage after revealing his unhappiness with an incident involving the Everton bench during the Toffees’ win at Selhurst Park.
Sean Dyche’s side ran out 3-2 winners in a thrilling clash on Saturday (11 November) thanks to goals from Vitalii Mykolenko, Abdoulaye Doucoure and Idrissa Geuye, but Hodgson was left irritated by the decision to book Eberechi Eze for diving.
The England international was booked for simulation after he went down in the penalty area under some pressure and the Palace manager was enraged by the cries from the Everton bench for Eze to be shown a red card.
As quoted by South London News (11 November) he said: “He doesn’t simulate. It wasn’t simulation and I did mention that to Anthony Taylor [the fourth official]. The referee doesn’t know Eze and the type of person he is, so he sees it as simulation and gives him a yellow card.
“It only makes a difference because Eze then has to be careful with every challenge. He bumped into someone five minutes later and the whole Everton bench was screaming for him to be sent off.”
Whether or not Eze dived in an attempt to win a penalty is still open to debate and not even Hodgson was certain that there was a clear foul in the area, which would suggest it was completely reasonable to book the Palace midfielder.
Every team in the Premier League would then be keen to appeal for a second yellow card whenever the England midfielder entered a challenge in the hope of seeing their opposition reduced to 10 men and Everton did exactly that on Saturday.
A manager who has been around the game as long as Hodgson should probably be expecting that reaction as it is part and parcel of the game. Unfortunately for the Toffees, they didn’t manage to get Eze sent off but they did manage to pick up all three points at Selhurst Park.
Dyche’s side extended their unbeaten run to four matches in all competitions with their win on Saturday and it finally feels as though Everton have got their season up and running. Hopefully, they can continue that momentum following the international break and move even further away from the relegation zone.
