Sean Dyche admitted Everton had been second best but praised their mentality after a stoppage-time Beto header rescued them a 1-1 draw at home against Fulham.
The substitute connected with Ashley Young’s delivery in the fourth minute of added time to cancel out former Toffees winger Alex Iwobi’s 61st-minute strike and extend Everton’s unbeaten run to five matches.
While they had a first-half effort disallowed for offside when Dominic Calvert-Lewin slotted in on the follow-up after Idrissa Gueye’s shot hit the bar, the hosts had struggled to show much threat during the contest before Beto’s last-gasp intervention.
And Everton manager Dyche said: “I thought we weren’t at it, I thought they were. I think they’re a good outfit anyway and they were better than us on the night.
“Not by a long shot – we weren’t in massive trouble, we weren’t getting rings ran round us, but just the feel of the game. I thought we were short of where we have been.
“On the other hand, the balance of football is it lasts for 96 minutes on this occasion and the mentality I’ve asked the players to continue growing is that relentlessness, and I think that was on show.
“The last 10 minutes you could sense we were knocking on the door all of a sudden, and when we did score I wasn’t that surprised because I felt the energy and the feeling of the game had changed, albeit for a short period.
“I was pleased in the end to keep the unbeaten run going and get a point.”
The equaliser was Beto’s first goal of the season and only his sixth since joining from Udinese in the summer of 2023, and Dyche said of the Guinnea-Bissau international: “Brian Clough used to have a saying, ‘sometimes you’ve got to get hurt to score a goal’, and I thought he was willing to.
“He was in the mix, he throws his head at it and it’s a good header.”
Dyche, whose side rise a place to 15th in the Premier League table, also said he had no update regarding an injury sustained by Dwight McNeil, adding: “Hopefully it’s nothing too serious.”