Demarai Gray strikes late to deny Nottingham Forest and rescue Everton point

Everton 1-1 Nottingham Forest: The Toffees rallied late after going behind to Brennan Johnson’s smart finish

Everton’s Conor Coady and Jordan Pickford celebrate after Demarai Gray’s late equaliser (Reuters)

An Everton winger had been in the spotlight this week and it wasn’t Demarai Gray. Chelsea’s interest in Anthony Gordon resulted in a £45m bid but Everton’s first point of the season came from a man acquired for just £1.75m last summer. A third successive defeat beckoned, along with their worst ever Premier League start, until Gray delivered a goal his electric display merited to deny Nottingham Forest a second successive victory and a first on the road in the top flight since 1999.

Jordan Pickford was his unlikely supplier. Perhaps the Everton goalkeeper could have done better when Forest took the lead, parrying Ryan Yates’s shot to Brennan Johnson, who slotted in unchallenged, but he turned creator by drilling a 70-yard pass to Gray, who escaped behind Forest’s defence to finish with composure.

It was an aberration from Forest. Amid the attention directed towards their 16 signings, their trio of centre-backs were stalwarts of their promotion campaign and Forest were a few minutes from a second successive clean sheet until Everton’s goalkeeper turned playmaker and Gray, perhaps the finest part of Rafa Benitez’s legacy, rode to the rescue for Frank Lampard.

It means Lucas Digne is no longer the lone player to score for Everton this season, which would be concerning enough were he still their left-back, but they sold the Frenchman in January. For much of an open game it seemed that while Forest are Europe’s second biggest spenders this summer, Everton could not buy a goal. If, once again, they could rue Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s ill-timed injury, Gray at least found a way of compensating for his absence.

If Forest’s spending formed the backdrop – and Morgan Gibbs-White, who had been on Everton’s radar, debuted as a second-half substitute after his £42.5m move from Wolves – both scorers demonstrated sizeable sums are not necessary to procure talent. Forest’s is a story of continuity and change and both Yates and Johnson are Nottingham-born products of their academy. A year ago, the latter had not even found the net in the Championship so a maiden Premier League goal capped a swift rise.

Nottingham Forest's Brennan Johnson celebrates scoring on 81 minutes (Reuters)

For Everton, too, there was a focus on a homegrown talent. Gordon drew four saves from Dean Henderson, starting with a long-range shot, followed by a curler, then a low drive and, as Everton sought a winner, an attempted lob. While he also collected a caution for chopping down Lewis O’Brien, the most notable element of his afternoon may simply be that a target for Thomas Tuchel played. Lampard is keen to keep him and the Everton crowd applauded him.

Gray was nevertheless brighter. There was menace in his free kicks, though they tended to be aimed for the unmarked Tom Davies and he miscued when he perhaps should have scored. He benefited from the presence of a focal point in attack, even if it was a substandard centre-forward. Making a belated first league start of Lampard’s reign, Salomon Rondon was largely immobile and ineffective and it remains the case that Everton have only beaten Norwich and Boreham Wood in games the Venezuelan has begun. It is scarcely a revelation to say that they need a striker. But, after a two-game experiment with a false nine was aborted, Gray enjoyed buzzing around a more conventional No 9, even if his goal came after Rondon had been withdrawn.

Everton’s Demarai Gray scores their equaliser (Reuters)

At the other end, Everton had shown hints of frailty. Conor Coady almost marked his home debut with an own goal. Pickford was required to parry shots from the former Liverpool pair of Neco Williams and Taiwo Awoniyi, while the Welsh wing-back fizzed a shot wide. But, if Gibbs-White’s entrance threatened to give Everton an unwanted illustration of what buying power can produce, instead the cheaper duo of Johnson and Gray delivered a scoreline that gave Lampard’s team some relief but, in the broader picture, should benefit Steve Cooper’s rather more.