Everton coach Roberto Martinez was full of praise for Romelu Lukaku after the Belgium international scored a brace in Everton’s 3-2 win at home to Newcastleon Monday. Lukaku, who is on loan for the season from Chelsea, scored the first and third goals as Everton cruised to a 3-0 halftime lead, only for Newcastle to mount a late second-half comeback thatultimately fell short.
“Lukaku is a young man who has everything as a striker. Sometimes you see a No. 9 who is powerful and has a great physical presence — what Romelu brings is a realawareness around him. I want him to enjoy his football, I want him to develop and become as good as he can,” Martinez said. When asked if he thought Chelsea made a mistake in loaning the talentedstriker to Everton for the season, the Spaniard replied: “It will be easy to say that but you need to remember how many strikers they have. You are talking about a squad which has phenomenal talent upfront.”
Meanwhile, Newcastle coach Alan Pardew lamented his team’s inability to get into the game until the second half. “I had to remind the players of the nuts andbolts of the game,” Pardew said, referring to his halftime team talk. “At least we won some tackles and headers in the second half and restored a bit of pride but it would have been fortuitous to getanything from the game because in the first half we were not good enough. Our defending was not up to the required standard.”