The Predator

Whether or not top-flight football should resume in a couple of weeks' time and whether there is any sanctity left in the spirit of the game given that it will restart without fans — and, potentially, a Merseyside derby taking place on neutral soil — is obviously open to debate. If there is a saving grace about seeing 2019-20 to completion, though, it's that the scoring exploits of Dominic Calvert-Lewin won't be lost to history.

The young striker was enjoying his breakout moment as a Premier League striker when the season was abruptly but necessarily suspended in March when the COVID-19 pandemic began its sweep across Britain and there was a possibility, however small, that the season might have to be curtailed and declared null and void — with its statistics and results potentially scrubbed with it.

Unless there is a significant coronavirus outbreak among top-flight clubs in the coming weeks, those remaining 92 matches will now be played and it offers Calvert-Lewin the chance to add to a goals tally that currently stands at 15, the most by an Everton player since Romelu Lukaku's final season, and continue his emergence as a forward of considerable talent and worth.

No one really knows what football is going to be like and feel like for the players once it resumes but the hope, of course, is that the long disruption won't have derailed Calvert-Lewin's scoring form — or that of his strike partner, Richarlison, for that matter. Certainly, he can't ever have been in better shape (as social media photos of him on his exercise bike, all sweat and chiselled six-pack, no doubt attest) but it remains to be seen how he and his team-mates emerge from three months of inaction.

It is, perhaps, those individual goals and achievements that might matter more when football resumes as a mere formality, stripped of its lifeblood in the stands, particularly given that Everton might soon have little to play for. Calvert-Lewin, however, has been particularly unfortunate given the timing of the shutdown because he was on the cusp of breaking into the senior England setup.

Harry Kane's injury lay-off meant that Dominic, as the in-form English striker, was a standout candidate to lead Gareth Southgate's attack in Euro 2020 if the Spurs star didn't make it but with that tournament now shelved until 2021 at least and the immediate future of international matches up in the air, his England prospects are on hold.

The good thing is that “DCL” is still relatively young, has time on his side and those admirers of his, Southgate included, no doubt, won't have forgotten the impact he was having at club level before the virus hit. If that form continues, he will inevitably get his shot at international level; in the meantime, he gets to continue justifying his bold claim to the prestigious No 9 Everton jersey under Carlo Ancelotti.

“It was a statement of intent for myself. Whether the fans doubted that was I capable of scoring goals, I knew I was,” Calvert-Lewin told one half of the Men In Blazers, Roger Bennett, in a Zoom interview for NBCSports this weekend. “So, I think with me asking for the number 9 shirt, it was welcoming that responsibility challenge and welcoming that pressure. I've always thrived under pressure and I enjoy that.”

That famous number may have been besmirched to a degree by the fact that it has been handed, unjustifiably in the eyes of some, to the likes of Arouna Koné and Sandro Ramirez (who accumulated 79 appearances between them and managed just 10 goals) but its significance to Blues fans remains. It was no small demand for Calvert-Lewin to make — he was a young striker, still largely unproven with many, this writer included (but read on for the caveat), still doubting that he would ever be able to live up to its history or the demands of the fanbase as a whole.

After all, under Marco Silva, the Sheffield-born player had developed the reputation of the striker who didn't score. As Everton struggled under the Portuguese over the first few months of the season, Calvert-Lewin registered just three league goals. He had shown flashes of his predatory talents with a well-taken brace back in his home city in a League Cup victory over Sheffield Wednesday and stepped off the bench at Brighton to score what might have proved to be a priceless winner had it not been for the scandalous intervention of VAR, but overall he was struggling to find the net on a consistent basis.

His tireless work ethic and physical presence — two hallmarks of his game that really should be appreciated — were there in abundance but the feeling was that that wasn't going to be enough. With Moise Kean needing time to adjust to life in England and looking himself a long way from being the answer up top, the club was surely going to have to make signing a centre-forward capable of filling Lukaku's shoes a priority in the summer of 2020.

There was a big caveat with the lack of faith in Calvert-Lewin's ability to be that player to succeed the prolific Belgian, however, and that was Silva's stubborn insistence on deploying him as a lone striker when it had become increasingly obvious that that was not going to lend itself to him scoring regularly.

It was little surprise, then, that when Duncan Ferguson assumed temporary control following Silva's dismissal and partnered DCL with Richarlison in a 4-4-2, the goals started flowing, sparked by a stirring brace in a memorable and cathartic win over Chelsea. When Carlo Ancelotti took charge of his first game on Boxing Day last year, it was Calvert-Lewin who scored the first goal of the new manager's reign as part of a run that saw him score 10 times in 14 games. A terrific return by any measure, more than enough for the rest of the game to sit up and take notice and the new manager wisely elected not to tinker with a budding strike partnership.

“I really enjoy playing with Richy,” he explained to Bennett. “It's something that's come naturally. Our games and our styles of play have just clicked and he's worked hard like I do myself so I think we're working for each other. When he scores, he's over the moon and when I score, he's over the moon and I think that's the key to having a good strike partnership — just being happy when we succeed and we succeed together.”

It's that down-to-earth attitude combined with ceaseless drive to improve that makes Calvert-Lewin so easy to like and root for and it explains why he has come as far as he has at Everton despite the instability that has plagued the club since he arrived. Initially signed for David Unsworth's Under-23s side as “one for the future”, he has been in the Toffees' first-team setup for the vast majority of his four years at Goodison. Ancelotti is the sixth coach the forward has played under since joining the club from Sheffield United in 2016.

DCL has unquestionably improved in spite of those difficult circumstances, being played out of position and given the forlorn task of leading the line as a lone striker in what was, until recently, a largely ineffective attacking team. He is by no means the finished article, he still isn't always as clinical as he needs to be, but he is emerging as a true penalty box predator when given the support from playing in a two and with the space that affords him.

“I took it upon myself to put the time into not being a workhorse centre-forward but [work on] the finer details to get myself into positions,” he said. “I don't think there's any magic potion but I feel like the experiences I've had and the age I'm at now, the penny's dropped and it's all coming together at the right place and the right time.

“It's all about living and breathing the game and that's what I've had to do,” he continued, echoing what he told The Athletic in March: “It's all about being in the right position and that doesn't come by accident.”

Still only 23 but always mature beyond his years, Calvert-Lewin, who once scored the goal that clinched for his country the U20 World Cup, is now blossoming into a goalscorer worthy of the growing attention he has been getting from beyond Merseyside. Ancelotti has publicly expressed his belief that he has all the qualities to become one of the best in his position in Europe and his worth to Everton was reflected in the award of a second contract extension which he signed earlier this year. It ties him to the Toffees until 2025, by which time he could be leading the Everton attack in a brand new stadium on the banks of the royal blue Mersey.

As the country remains in the grip of the coronavirus crisis and both the short-term future of the Premier League and the longer-term outlook of football finance and transfers are so uncertain, Everton's new stadium and the bright new world it promises feel an awfully long way away.

But in the interim, given the fact that Marcel Brands's and Ancelotti's team-building plans may have to adapt, there's a certain comfort in knowing that in the likes of Richarlison and Dominic Calvert-Lewin, the Blues have a budding young strike force in place. Fingers crossed that recruitment team can build the team around them that is capable of realising Evertonian ambitions.