Everton 0 - 0 Wimbledon

29 April 1995

Yellow cards

Everton: Hinchcliffe
Wimbledon: Jones, Fear, Elkins, Holdsworth

Lineups

Everton: Southall 7, Barrett 6, Watson 7, Unsworth 8, Ablett 7, Limpar 7 (45. Rideout 6), Horne 6, Parkinson 9, Hinchcliffe 7, Stuart 6, Amokachi 8

Wimbledon: Sullivan, Cunningham, Thorn (30. Perry), Reeves, Kimble, Fear, Jones, Elkins, Leonhardsen, Ekoku (68. Goodman), Holdsworth

Subs not used: Jackson, Kearton (Everton), Segers (Wimbledon)

Officiating

Referee: P S Danson (Leicester)

Attendance: 33,063

Overview

Underground, Overground, Elbowing free..

For entertainment value, you'd be hard pressed to find worse. Only people who enjoy midfield scraps and defensive smothering would have had anything to enjoy.

Amo started with Stuart up front. In the second half Rideout came on for Limpar.

Wimbledon certainly didn't look like a team who have conceded 39 away goals this season. They knew how to stop Everton - close every possession down, hassle, worry & niggle and pack the midfield and defence with bodies. It worked. Luckily the likes of Spurs & Man Utd don't play this way.. and as far as I know neither so any of our four remaining opponents.

The ref (Danson) was no help, as he was not interested in the Wimbledon defenders' style of jumping for every ball with an elbow projecting towards their blue opponent.

The second half saw a big improvement in Everton, and Wimbledon's attacks dried up as they settled for the point early; JR seemed to manage to spread the play and get the defenders to give away enough space to let Blue bodies create chances and gain corners.

If anyone (from the assoc of footy statisticians?) kept count of the number of throw-ins, I think we might have seen the world record yesterday!

Team Performance 6. A second successive spluttering display.