Everton's Unbeaten Start Survives but Hull Punish Familiar Road Fade

Everton's unbeaten start to the season survived Sunday's trip to the MKM Stadium, but the 2-2 draw with Hull City did nothing to solve the puzzle at the heart of it. The visitors had the ball, the shots and the big chances. They also had a lead.

The raw figures from FotMob tell a story of control. Everton had 65 possession to Hull's 35, 15 shots to nine, seven on target to five, and eight big chances to Hull's two. Their expected goals of 1.71 against Hull's 1.33 point the same way. Hull, set up in a 5-4-1, spent much of the afternoon absorbing pressure and looking to spring forward.

On the balance of play, this was an away performance that should have ended in a win. The live-blog verdict is blunter: Everton "completely switched off in their own half after taking the lead and were punished, throwing away two points when they were cruising to a win here." That is the crux of the afternoon. The process — possession, territory, chance creation — was largely sound. The game management was not. A side with eight big chances and 65 possession should not be relying on late interventions to rescue a point.

Hull deserve their share of the credit. Mohamed El Bachir Belloumi, who has two goals and two assists this season, was again the player they leaned on, with Ryan John Giles and Oliver Robert McBurnie offering support further forward. Hull's goals scored minus expected goals in this match was 0.67, against an average of 0.0 across their earlier 2026/27 matches in all competitions — a reminder that on this occasion they finished better than their chances suggested. Whether that is repeatable or a one-off is a question the coming weeks will answer.

For Everton, the attacking burden fell to Thierno Mamadou Barry and Kiernan Frank Dewsbury-Hall, and the pair led the line as expected. The bench offered options: Christian Norgaard, Dibling and George were all among the substitutes, with Vitalii Mykolenko failing to make it. Whether those late changes helped or hindered is a fair question, but the research does not settle it, and neither should we.

The wider picture is what matters. Pre-match, Hull had eight points from five games and Everton nine from five with a plus-three goal difference. Everton remain unbeaten, but an unbeaten record that includes a growing pile of draws on the road is not the same as a top-four push. The difference between the two is game management — closing out leads, managing the moments after scoring, and turning control into three points rather than one.

Hull, meanwhile, continue to look like a newly promoted side whose underlying numbers deserve respect. They have now taken points off an unbeaten visitor in a game where they trailed, and they did it without several players: Jack Butland, Darko Gyabi, Hidemasa Morita, Eliot Matazo and Nobel Mendy were all absent, with Matt Targett and Elliot Stroud doubts.

The result keeps both early-season narratives alive. Everton's is the more urgent: how many points have they now dropped from winning positions, and how long can an unbeaten start mask a road record that is not producing wins? Hull's is the more encouraging: a side that was expected to struggle is matching unbeaten visitors and taking points from losing positions. The next few matches will tell us which of those stories holds.