Frank Lampard is no closer to finding out if Everton have the cojones for a relegation battle – although this defeat will hurt like a kick in the codpiece.
The Toffees manager had questioned his players' fortitude in adversity after last month's FA Cup surrender at Crystal Palace. In fairness, this was their most committed away performance on Lampard's watch - but it still wasn't enough to beat West Ham when they were on autopilot ahead of Thursday night's Europa League quarter-final against Lyon.
Briefly, Mason Holgate's equaliser gave Lampard hope that the tide might be turning in his old stamping ground. But in the land of pie and mash, Everton could only come up with shortcrust – and no gravy. They conceded a poor second goal when they were on top, and Michael Keane's red card sealed the Toffees' fate.
That's three games in a row they have finished a man short after Allan and Jonjoe Kenny's expulsions against Newcastle and Wolves. Everton are the first team to suffer three dismissals in as many Premier League games since Watford in December 2017, when Marvin Zeegelaar, Tom Cleverley and Troy Deeney ran the early bath.
Lampard's away record to date reads like a threatening letter - played five, lost five, two goals scored, 16 against – and Wednesday night's trip to Burnley now feels like a gravediggers' duel. This fixture always revives memories of Lampard's old man dancing around the corner flag, like a Morris dancer doing laps of a Maypole, after heading the winner in an FA Cup semi-final replay 42 years ago. But Everton, nursing the worst away record in the country – just six points from 14 excursions – need results, not nostalgia.
Their travel sickness wasn't helped when on-loan Manchester United midfielder Donny van de Beek pulled up lame during the warm-up. From missed chances at one end (with Richarlison the chief culprit) to soppy mistakes at the other and ill discipline, all the classic signs of a struggling team were on show - although, for half an hour of shadow boxing, nothing happened at the Taxpayers Stadium.
Then Jarrod Bowen, returning just four weeks after fracturing a bone in his foot, was fouled 25 yards out and Aaron Cresswell accepted the invitation exquisitely. Cresswell's free-kick, whipped into top-left corner beyond Jordan Pickford, was his fourth goal direct from a free-kick, going past Dimitri Payet's club record as the Hammers' deadliest set-piece specialist.
“We were trying to work out how many free-kicks 'Cressie' has taken before he scored, and I had a guess of about 625,” joked Hammers boss David Moyes. "He has great ability and it was a great goal – but we will never hear the end of it, that's the problem.”
Everton did not deserve to be behind at the break, and within eight minutes of the restart Mason brought them level with the help of a telling deflection off Pablo Fornals to leave Hammers keeper Lukasz Fabianski stranded. Just when they were within sight of calmer waters, however, Everton capsized the lifeboat twice in the space of seven minutes.
First Alex Iwobi's mistake and Fornals' pass left Michail Antonio generous space to gallop clear, and although Pickford blocked the Jamaican's shot, Bowen devoured his 13th goal of the season from the rebound. Then Keane, already on a yellow card, wiped out Antonio to leave the Toffees dispirited and depleted.
Arms folded, and then hands in pockets, Lampard could only stand in his technical area and glower as Cresswell sent the resulting free-kick perilously close to another bullseye.
