Everton’s attack has packed less of a punch than Will Smith at the Oscars of late but as they look for someone to deliver a ‘Hammer blow’, Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s work over the international break comes into sharp focus. With a trip to West Ham United coming up on Sunday, both the player and Blues alike could do with a repeat of last season to set them up for the Premier League run-in.
In May, the striker’s 24th-minute goal gave Everton a 1-0 victory at the London Stadium and although it’s less than a year on, they unfortunately return in rather less robust health than on that occasion. Although both clubs have dropped down the table since that match, the Hammers’ slide from fifth to seventh is far less dramatic and they’re still only six points off a Champions League berth compared to the five after that reversal.
Carlo Ancelotti’s men, in eighth place, were a mere three points behind David Moyes’ side following the win – with a game in hand – but the current Blues crop are currently languishing on the club's lowest-ever points total at this stage of a Premier League season with just 25 points from 27 games, leaving them just one place above the relegation zone.
READ MORE: Dele Alli facing key Everton spell as transfer question looms for Frank Lampard
READ MORE: Everton have changed under Frank Lampard but stark truth emerges over how they must improve
Of all their players whose year-on-year contributions have slid, the removal of Calvert-Lewin’s goals from the Everton side has been the starkest. His winner at West Ham last term was one of 16 in the Premier League last season and 21 in all competitions including a hat-trick against the same opponents in a Carabao Cup tie.
Despite netting three times in the first three outings of this term, he subsequently spent the next four months on the sidelines with a quadriceps injury and after skying a penalty against Brighton & Hove Albion on his return on January 2, has struggled to rediscover his previous form and has yet to add to his tally, with the team as a whole scoring just once - nine minutes into stoppage time in the dramatic 1-0 home win over Newcastle United - in their last six matches against Premier League opponents.
Outlining the regime Calvert-Lewin faced at Finch Farm between the FA Cup humbling at Crystal Palace and Sunday's trip to West Ham, after not being called up by England, Blues boss Frank Lampard said: “Now’s a good time for us to work with him in the international break to get that edge, that fitness, to get robust. We’ll need him, we want our big players who have delivered before to deliver again.”
The Everton manager’s own words are the key here. It’s high time that the big players start delivering. Despite the club’s desperate recruitment of recent years, here is a squad packed with internationals who should still be pushing for a place in Europe – like they were last season before their late collapse – not merely fighting to stay in the division.
Calvert-Lewin has been linked with a potential move away from Goodison Park in recent days with Arsenal and West Ham touted as possible destinations. While the Gunners rumours have been periodically doing the rounds for some time now, the Hammers speculation is curious and perhaps a damning indictment to how far Everton have fallen this term.
Under the stewardship of long-time Blues boss Moyes, his side are enjoying one of the more-consistent periods in the club’s history but it seems perverse that moving from Everton to West Ham could somehow be considered a step up. In terms of respective histories, there is of course no competition between the pair but past glories mean nothing in the here and now – especially of course if Lampard’s men do suffer the catastrophe of relegation.
What would be even crueller for their long-suffering fans though is the prospect of those 'big players' jumping ship – and for possibly a reduced price – because their own shortcomings had caused the Blues to go down.
For a long time, Calvert-Lewin looked like an accomplished all-round striker who almost had it all in that his build-up play was tidy but he seemed to lack the natural poacher’s instincts in the penalty box. Under Ancelotti – and with Duncan Ferguson’s help – he developed into a potent one-touch finisher (be it with his head or either foot) in more recent times but now Everton need their number nine to show that such needs were no mere flash in the pan and he can rise to the occasion when they need him the most.
