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Hello, and welcome to today’s liveblog.
As you’ll see from the team news below, Everton have three Irish players in their starting line-up with Darron Gibson on the bench.
EVERTON: Howard, Baines, Distin, Jagielka, Coleman, Barry, McCarthy, McGeady, Naismith, Mirallas, Lukaku. Subs: Joel, Gibson, Besic, Osman, Stones, Alcaraz, Eto’o.
CHELSEA: Courtois, Azpilicueta, Terry, Cahill, Ivanovic, Matic, Fabregas, Ramires, Willian, Hazard, Costa. Subs: Cech, Luis, Zouma, Drogba, Mikel, Schurrle, Salah.
(Everton’s new signing Samuel Eto’o is at Goodison Park today)
We’re underway…
GOAL FOR CHELSEA!
Everton 0-1 Chelsea (Costa 1)
Chelsea have taken the lead after less than a minute.
Fabregas plays through Diego Costa to score for a third consecutive time in Chelsea colours.
GOAL FOR CHELSEA!
Everton 0-2 Chelsea (Ivanovic 3)
Ramires plays in a suspiciously offside-looking Ivanovic, who coolly finishes to double Chelsea’s advantage early on.
Everton have a real mountain to climb now.
Here’s a look at the two goals so far.
9 mins: Everton look rattled and are making countless sloppy individual errors.
Tim Howard is a lucky man after he appears to pick up the ball outside the box but the ref waves play on.
The ball is in the Chelsea net but it’s correctly ruled out for offside.
A header crashed off the crossbar and Distin slotted it in from close range.
21 mins: Seamus Coleman gets to the by-line and crosses to Naismith, whose shot is blocked by a Chelsea defender.
Everton are getting a lot of joy down the right with Hazard looking vulnerable defensively and Coleman in particular posing a threat.
Meanwhile, in Milan, Spanish striker Fernando Torres, left, sits in a car next to AC Milan CEO Adriano Galliani shortly after arriving at Linate airport.
26 mins: McGeady’s strike deflects off Ivanovic and goes out for a corner.
Everton are playing well now and look the more likely side to get the next goal.
31 mins: Good defending from Terry, who intercepts yet another Everton attack down the right.
Chelsea may consider making a change in that area at half-time.
33 mins: Everton continue to enjoy better possession and Mirallas has just forced a save from Courtois.
The Toffees have just lacked a cutting edge and ruthlessness in front of goal that Chelsea displayed early on.
41 mins: Controversial call. Jagielka — who has looked shaky today — loses possession in a dangerous area and Costa is played through on goal before rounding the keeper and hitting the post.
He’s wrongly adjudged offside and missed anyway, but Costa may argue he would have scored had he not heard the whistle.
GOAL FOR EVERTON!
Everton 1-2 Chelsea (Mirallas 44 mins)
McGeady and Coleman link up down the right with the latter putting in a lovely cross that Mirallas heads home exquisitely.
They’ve been a threat down the right all half and Chelsea have finally been punished for their inability to deal with the Irish full-back.
HALF-TIME: EVERTON 1-2 CHELSEA
The second half is underway…
Here’s a look at that sublime Mirallas header.
50 mins: A dangerous Everton free-kick is floated in and Distin can’t quite connex=ct with the header. He’s offside anyway.
The opening 15 minutes aside, Everton have been the better team.
As I type, Costa breaks the Toffees’ offside trap again, but this time, Howard gets down well to make the save.
It’s been a very entertaining game to watch so far.
It’s getting a little bad tempered at the moment.
Diego Costa has just been booked and needs to calm down or risk getting sent off.
58 mins: Seamus Coleman wins a free kick in a dangerous area after being fouled by Azpilicueta.
The Irish full-back has been brilliant today.
63 mins: Lukaku is almost played through on goal, but Terry makes an important interception.
The frenetic pace that has characterised much of this game is showing no sign of letting up.
GOAL FOR CHELSEA!
Everton 1-3 Chelsea (Coleman OG 66)
Hazard gets away from McCarthy and his attempted cross deflects off the unlucky Coleman and goes in.
GOAL FOR EVERTON!
Everton 2-3 Chelsea (Naismith 69)
Great play from McGeady who gets away from his man and plays through Naismith, who slots it into the corner of the net.
It’s the Ireland winger’s last act, as he’s replaced by Eto’o.
Here are those two goals…
GOAL FOR CHELSEA!
Everton 2-4 Chelsea (Matic 73)
The Everton defence back off their man and he strikes it into the corner from just outside the box to pull Chelsea clear with his first goal in the Premier League.
GOAL FOR EVERTON!
GOAL FOR CHELSEA!
Everton 3-5 Chelsea (Eto’o 75, Ramires 76)
Eto’o guides a header into the corner from an inswinging free-kick to give Everton hope before Ramires is played through before finishing well and surely finally ending this game as a contest.
Here are the latest two goals in this thrilling game.
79 mins: Mirallas has just come so close to making it 5-4.
His volley after a well-worked move forces a finger-tip save from Courtois.
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Ramires is down, thus allowing everyone to have a rare chance to catch their breath.
Drogba comes on for Chelsea with Cesc Fabregas going off, while Besic replaces Lukaku for Everton.
GOAL FOR CHELSEA!
Everton 3-6 Chelsea (Costa 90)
With his first touch, Besic unwittingly plays Chelsea through on goal with an ill-advised backheel.
Diego Costa subsequently rounds the goalkeeper and scores Chelsea’s sixth to effectively confirm the Londoners’ victory.
Here’s Chelsea’s latest (and surely final) goal.
FULL-TIME: EVERTON 3-6 CHELSEA
So all in all, it was a deserved victory for Chelsea.
Everton showed good character to continually threaten a comeback, but ultimately too many individual mistakes at the back cost them dearly.
Chelsea were clinical in exposing their opponents’ flaws, but like Roberto Martinez, Jose Mourinho will be concerned at how vulnerable they looked defensive, particularly down their left, with Seamus Coleman running rampant at times.
(Chelsea’s Diego Costa celebrates his team’s third goal of the game after Everton’s Seamus Coleman scores an own goal)
(Chelsea’s Eden Hazard and Everton’s Seamus Coleman battle for the ball)
Right, that’s all from me for now, thanks for reading and commenting.
We’ll have more reaction up on the site shortly.
