PICKFORD IS THE HERO AS TOFFEES PICK UP A POINT
JORDAN PICKFORD simply cannot stay out of the spotlight. The England keeper made up for an own goal with a magnificent triple save at the end of this game to ensure Everton avoided a fourth successive defeat.
When Sheffield United striker Oli McBurnie headed goalwards from six yards in the ninth minute of added time, Pickford flew to his right and pushed the ball on to the bar. That was impressive enough, but Pickford topped it by recovering quickly to block two follow-up attempts.
Sheffield United manager Paul Heckingbottom called it ‘an unreal save’ and his opposite number Sean Dyche said: ‘Jordan made a brilliant save and it makes you realise how mad football can be. We could have ended up losing the game, which would have been an injustice.’
At full-time, Dyche could feel relieved and Pickford was happier than he had been an hour earlier.
Cameron Archer had marked his league debut for the Blades by cancelling out Abdoulaye Doucoure’s scrappy opener when, following some brilliant work by Scotland striker McBurnie, he fired home.
Then, in first-half stoppage time, Archer’s curling effort hit the post. Pickford dived to his left and was distraught when the ball rebounded off the post, hit him on the head — or his ‘bonce’ as he called it later — and bounced back into the net.
Arnaut Danjuma had eased some of Pickford’s pain by bringing Everton level soon after the restart, tapping in from Nathan Patterson’s excellent delivery.
Pickford then came up with his heroics and Blades boss Heckingbottom knows his side need those moments to go in their favour this season.
He said: ‘We are not stupid, we know that we are going to need a lot of those moments to go in our favour this season, of course we are. Today it didn’t.
‘I can’t grumble, I think it was a really good game and probably a fair result.’