‘It’s going to be a process’ – Beard.

Two goals in either half from the Toffees ensured City left Walton Hall Park empty handed on Sunday afternoon.

“I think there are positives to take from the game and I have learnt a lot about the group today,” said Beard

“We have them too much respect in the first half and towards the end of the second half we were excellent.

“Two or three of the goals were frustrating today as they are preventable, and we restricted them to chances through mistakes. They’ve scored from a set play, two crosses and us turning the ball over.

“From that point of view it is frustrating, but if you look towards the back end of the game, we had a couple of great chances, a goal disallowed, and I feel as though at 2-0 we should have had a penalty for the foul on Yana.

“The fact we have had one training session together and I have asked them to do something a little different, you could see in the first half we were a little bit hesitant but the performance in the second half was pleasing and shown that we do have enough to pick up the points we need.

“With players that we’ve got to coming back from injury and isolation I think we have what we need to kick on and I’m pleased by what I’ve seen from the last two day’s training and hopefully we can pick results up moving forward and get amongst the teams above us.

“It’s going to be a process, so I’m glad I’ve got a full week with the group to have more time with them to work through the areas that need improving and how we want to set up and play.”