Everton manager Frank Lampard to work with Anthony Gordon on his finishing

The highly-rated 21-year-old midfielder has attracted interest from Chelsea.

Andy Hampson
Monday 22 August 2022 03:30 EDT
Comments
Anthony Gordon has caught the eye at Everton (Peter Byrne/PA)
Anthony Gordon has caught the eye at Everton (Peter Byrne/PA) (PA Wire)

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

Frank Lampard is keen to help Anthony Gordon develop into an efficient goalscoring midfielder whilst at Everton.

The highly-rated Gordon has been linked with a move to Lampard’s old club Chelsea but the Toffees hope to keep the dynamic 21-year-old.

Lampard feels one of the next phases in Gordon’s development will be to improve his finishing.

Having been a prolific goalscoring midfielder himself, this is a subject the Everton manager knows plenty about.

As a player, Lampard joined Chelsea at the age of 22 in 2001 and went on to become their record goalscorer over the course of a glittering 13-year spell with the London club.

Interestingly, however, Lampard is not sure he would have hit the ground running had he moved to Stamford Bridge at a similar age in the modern game.

Lampard said: “At 20 years of age I wouldn’t have got into a modern-day Chelsea team with the way I was playing. I would probably have had to go there and find my way into the team.

“I wasn’t feeling as confident to rack up big numbers until I was in my low to mid-twenties – 23, 24 and onwards.

“It is a process, and players absolutely can improve on it by working time and time again, recreating situations and positions to get better at it.

“The more they see that works, the more confident they get and the better players they become.

“We work on it all the time. It is a general thing we work on with attacking players.”

Gordon created a number of chances for himself in Everton’s 1-1 draw with Nottingham Forest on Saturday – the club’s first Premier League point of the season – but was unable to find the net.

Lampard feels there is a lot to work on but is convinced Gordon has the desire to do so.

Anthony has a lot of strings to his bow and the goalscoring one will come

Frank Lampard

He said: “Anthony is a great professional, he has a great hunger as a young lad. He wants to work on his finishing.

“Some of it is just pure development – as a young player who gave us so much last year in his output, the goals will just come. But it takes a bit of time sometimes to get that in your game.

“Even for some of the greatest players, to expect them to be plundering goals at 21-22 is not always the norm. There is the occasional exception, number nines, (Erling) Haaland etc – it is their thing.

“But Anthony has a lot of strings to his bow and the goalscoring one will come.”

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in