Proud Beattie hails battling Toffees
Down to 10 men from the ninth minute with rookie ‘keeper Iain Turner sent off on his league debut after a daft rush of blood that saw him handle outside his box, Everton proudly emphasised the virtues that took them to a shock appearance in the Champions League by finishing fourth last season.
They produced a performance of guts, driven on by a howling crowd that turned creaking Goodison Park into a bear pit again.
With Nigel Martyn and Richard Wright out injured the last thing they wanted was for their third choice keeper to be sitting distraught in the dressing room and teenager John Ruddy on the pitch while 35,000 punters were still settling into their seats.
But referee Peter Walton, despite constant abuse from then on, had no option but to brandish the red card.
With a crashing Beattie header to boost them, Everton then produced a magnificent rearguard action that broke Blackburn’s spirit.
Beattie said: “To the letter of the law the referee was correct about Iain’s red card.
He (Walton) was saying ‘sorry’ to us and that he didn’t want to send him off but it was just the law and he had handled the ball outside the box.
“Blackburn had a lot of possession and we had to defend pretty deep at times, but everybody put the work in that was needed and we got a fantastic result. I looked around when Iain was getting sent off and a lot of heads could have dropped but I could see the lads were well up for it because of the nature of what happened.
“They were so hungry to get the win. It’s not that I haven’t been before, but I feel very proud to be an Everton player after that.”
He added: “I got the goal. The delivery was perfect for my header, Mikel (Arteta) is an exceptional player, his passing and delivery is as good as anybody in the world.
"I was pretending to be tired but managed eye contact with Mikel so he knew what I was doing and what I wanted, and that just got the defender away from me for a few seconds and it worked perfectly.”
Colleague Phil Neville, who drove the side on with a performance of quality and maturity from midfield, spelt it out. He said: “We have got a never-say-die attitude in abundance. When I joined the club in the summer it was that attitude, from outside looking in, you always felt Everton had.
"But maybe for six months we lost some of that toughness, some of that ‘nobody is going to beat us’ siege mentality. But since Christmas we have got it back.”
Former Everton star Hughes knew he had been beaten by a crowd as much as a team.
“The crowd were excellent for Everton, they were their 11th man and drove them on and Everton deserved it,” he said.
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