Frank Lampard is facing a crucial 10-day period which could decide Everton's Premier League fate.
With the Blues dangling dangerously close to the relegation zone, and the new manager’s team painfully lacking in confidence and belief on their travels, Lampard knows he needs goals to keep the Goodison club up. Last season’s top scorer Dominic Calvert-Lewin is the obvious candidate to provide them after scoring 21 last term, but he has been cut down by injury for a large part of the campaign.
Lampard has treated him gently since arriving, with the striker coming from the bench in the last two games, but now the boss has a two week break to attempt to get the England striker back closer to his fit and healthy best. And he admitted it could be crucial to Everton ’s survival hopes.
“We’ll need him - we’ll need our big players who have delivered before to deliver again,” he said. “Now's a good time for us to work with him in the international break to get that edge, that fitness, to get robust. It can hopefully be the start for him.
“I really hope it does (help improve his confidence). He's had a tough time with injuries. He's a good lad who wants the best, he's a young lad still.”
Calvert-Lewin wasn’t Everton’s penalty taker last season, and without them, he was the second highest scorer in the Premier League, level with Mo Salah, who scored six from the spot. Yet this season he has scored only three goals - two from the spot - and the Blues have desperately missed his influence in front of goal.
Now Lampard has two clear weeks to get him fit and firing again, and the manager said: “We’ve got a block of 10 days where some players not on international duty can work hard, and get some fitness in the bank for the run-in.
"Some players (like Dominic) need it, (after) not playing so much coming off the back of injuries. We’ll construct plans individually, and collectively there will be good work.”
Calvert-Lewin’s goals will be required even more, with news that Everton’s top scorer this season, Andros Townsend, could miss the rest of the campaign with the knee injury he suffered at Palace. The Blues are likely to get scan results on Tuesday, but there are fears he has damaged knee ligaments which would rule him out for several months.
And Lampard said after the FA Cup tie: "It looks bad. A knee injury. He got his studs caught in the grass and we’ll scan him over the next day or two but the early signs are that it will be a bad knee injury."
The Blues have scored just five times in six Premier League matches since Lampard took over, with three coming in the win against Leeds, and realistically, they need Calvert-Lewin back to keep them out of the drop zone.
