Everton get big opportunity to give Sean Dyche what he craves

After banishing their away day Blues, Everton now have the chance to turn Goodison Park back into the “fortress” that Sean Dyche craves.

Everton’s richly-deserved victories at Brentford last Saturday (3-1 in the Premier League) and Aston Villa on Wednesday (2-1 in the Carabao Cup) were their first consecutive away wins against top flight opposition since Roberto Martinez’s swashbuckling first season in March 2014 when they triumphed 3-0 at Newcastle United and 3-1 at Fulham in the space of five days.

They’d actually extend the sequence to three with a 1-0 success at Sunderland the following month to complete a six-match winning streak that helped them towards the club’s highest points total of the Premier League era (72) to finish fifth, some 11 points more than when they recorded their highest Premier League finish of fourth in 2004/05.

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Success on home turf has more difficult to achieve of late though. Back in April, ahead of the visit of Marco Silva’s Fulham, Dyche – who worked for almost a decade at Burnley whose Turf Moor ground is just over half the size of Goodison – spoke about his hopes for exploiting the power of the Blues’ passionate and numerous home support.

He said: “We want to build that mentality at home, that fortress created by the fans and the way they go about it.

“They have been excellent. Home or away, by the way, I couldn’t question them.

“I think the team have responded at home and some of the away performances. They stepped off a little bit last week, but generally the team have responded and given the