Gerrard wins battle of midfield greats as Aston Villa beat Lampard’s Everton
Steven Gerrard won the battle of two midfield greats on Saturday as his Aston Villa side beat Frank Lampard's Everton at Villa Park.
Both sides were in search of their first points of the season in the early kick-off, having lost their opening matches last weekend. However, it was the hosts who grabbed all three points, with goals from Danny Ings and Emiliano Buendia securing a 2-1 win to delight Gerrard in the dugout.
The match also represented the first meeting between Gerrard and Lampard since they ventured into management following highly successful playing careers at both club and international level.
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Ings put Villa ahead during the first half with a powerful left-footed strike from inside the area, firing the ball past a helpless Jordan Pickford on the swivel.
That lead was then doubled five minutes from full-time as substitute Buendia tapped the ball into an empty net after being set up brilliantly by Ollie Watkins.
The Toffees pulled a goal back almost immediately, though, with Amadou Onana's square ball ricocheting into the net off former Everton defender Lucas Digne.
Villa were able to hold on to their lead, however, and bounce back from last weekend's disappointing defeat away to newly promoted Bournemouth.
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Gerrard was pleased with what he saw from his players as well, telling the BBC after the match: “I’m really pleased with our level of performance. I think that was the most important thing.
"I believed that if we found our level of performance it would be a different outcome to last week. I questioned our performance last week, I don’t think it was good enough, and the outcome we certainly deserved.
"But to come back this week, what we’ve put into the game, the quality, the goals we’ve scored. I think we could’ve even scored a few more.”
His side will look to make it back-to-back wins away to Crystal Palace next weekend, meanwhile Lampard and Everton will welcome Nottingham Forest at Goodison Park as they bid to claim their first points of the campaign.
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