Everton Overcome Palace for Opening Day Victory

Everton have spent too many recent Augusts chasing their tails. Not this time.

David Moyes’ side rode out an early onslaught, leaned on Jordan Pickford’s reflexes and the sharpness of Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, and beat Crystal Palace 2-0 at Hill Dickinson Stadium to claim their first opening-day Premier League victory in five years.

It is their earliest league win in a season since Rafa Benitez’s Everton turned over Southampton 3-1 in August 2021. It also snaps an eight-game winless league run that stretched back into the gloom of last spring. For once, the mood around Everton in mid-August is light.

Palace strike the woodwork, Everton strike first

The afternoon began with a warning siren for the hosts. Palace, already handicapped by the absence of last season’s 21-goal top scorer Ismaila Sarr – left out of the squad by new manager Pierre Sage amid ongoing links to Galatasaray – still came flying out.

Inside four minutes, they should have led. Eddie Nketiah pounced on a weak defensive header from James Tarkowski and fed Jean-Philippe Mateta, only for the forward to lash over from inside the area. Everton were rattled. They stayed rattled for a while.

Dewsbury-Hall then dragged them into the contest. Eight minutes after that early scare, he slipped a clever pass into Merlin Rohl, operating as an improvised full-back. Rohl picked out Iliman Ndiaye, whose low drive was straight at Dean Henderson. The chance settled Everton, but it did not stem the Palace tide.

Sage, fresh from an eye-catching season with RC Lens, watched his new side hit the woodwork twice. Nketiah clipped the post. Mateta struck it as well. On another day, Everton would have been buried by half-time.

Instead, the punishment came at the other end.

Three minutes before the break, Dewsbury-Hall found a pocket of space on the edge of the area and arrowed a precise finish into the far corner. Against the run of Palace’s chances, Everton led. The new stadium, so often subdued last season, finally had something to roar.

Barry doubles up, Palace’s day unravels

If the first half was chaotic, the second began with clarity. Everton stepped on the gas and Palace never really recovered.

Eight minutes after the restart, Ndiaye bent in a wicked cross from the left. Thierno Barry timed his run perfectly and thumped a close-range header beyond Henderson. From nervy to comfortable in the space of a few seconds, Everton suddenly looked at ease in their new surroundings.

For Palace, the afternoon then turned from frustrating to grim. Midway through the half, defender Chadi Riad went down in obvious distress and was carried off on a stretcher after what appeared to be a serious knee injury. The sight drained what remained of the visitors’ momentum.

Sage, already dealing with Sarr’s absence and the lingering impact of summer departures, cut an increasingly deflated figure on the touchline. His Premier League baptism was proving unforgiving, defined by missed chances, the width of the post and a ruthless home side.

Hill Dickinson starts to feel like home

It has taken close to a year, but Everton are finally starting to grow into Hill Dickinson Stadium.

Moyes had likened last season – just six wins from 19 home league games – to moving into a new house with only the wallpaper up. The structure was there, the feel was not. This performance did not erase all the doubts, and the manager knows his squad still needs a natural right-back and one or two more additions, but it changed the tone.

Pickford produced a couple of outstanding saves to keep Palace at bay during their first-half surge. Dewsbury-Hall knitted Everton’s play together and provided the decisive breakthrough. Barry and Ndiaye stretched the game and punished Palace’s looseness at the back.

By the final whistle, the nervous energy that often hung over this place had given way to something different: genuine optimism. Not wild celebration, not yet, but a sense that if reinforcements arrive before the window closes, this season might look very different from the last.

Palace face the comedown

For Palace, this was a jarring step back after a glittering 12 months. Three trophies, including the FA Cup and the Conference League, had pushed expectations to a new level. Even the most upbeat supporters knew a reset was coming after Oliver Glasner’s departure, but the reality hit hard on Merseyside.

Losing Maxence Lacroix in defence, the uncertainty around Sarr, and now a worrying injury to Riad leave Sage facing a tricky opening stretch. His team created enough to take something from the game; they left with nothing but regrets and a reminder of how brutal this league can be.

On another afternoon, with Sarr on the pitch and those early efforts clipping the inside rather than the outside of the post, Palace might have been the ones dancing down the tunnel. Instead, they trudged away, their new manager given a stark lesson in Premier League fine margins.

Everton walked off to applause, their new home finally echoing with the sound of a team that looks ready to belong there. Palace walked into a future suddenly crowded with questions.