The Numbers Game: Can Frank's away-day specialists end Everton's unbeaten start at Hill Dickinson Stadium?

Hill Dickinson Stadium will host the final Premier League encounter of matchday nine as Everton welcome Tottenham to Merseyside this Sunday. 

Both teams endured losing returns to domestic action following the October international break.

After ending Crystal Palace's 19-game unbeaten run, Everton were put to the sword by Erling Haaland, who netted twice in a 2-0 win for Manchester City last weekend.

Spurs, meanwhile, failed to build on Rodrigo Bentancur's fifth-minute opener against Aston Villa, with goals in either half from Morgan Rogers and substitute Emiliano Buendia seeing their poor run at home under Thomas Frank continue.

David Moyes' team will come into the encounter fresher, given Spurs were involved in midweek Champions League action, where they played out a goalless draw with Monaco at Stade Louis-II, largely helped by Guglielmo Vicario's goalkeeping heroics. 

Spurs and Everton both have ambitions of securing European football in 2025-26, and this could provide an early litmus test of where these two teams really are.

With the help of Opta data, we dive into the pre-match statistics and predictions.

What's expected?

Spurs may have struggled to get going at home under Frank, but they head into Sunday's clash unbeaten on the road in the league in 2025-26.

In fact, they have the most away points in the top flight this season (10 – W3 D1), with 71% of their points this term having been won on the road (10/14).

Only once in the Premier League era have they won 13+ points in their first five away games of a season, doing so in 2020-21 (13), but that could change here.

Although Tottenham have only lost one of their last 12 Premier League away games against Everton (W3 D8), they are winless in their last six visits to the Toffees (D5 L1), losing the corresponding fixture last season 3-2 in January, though that was at Goodison Park. 

Everton have lost just one of their last 13 home league matches (W5 D7), going down 2-0 to Man City in April. They are unbeaten in all four this season, last having a longer unbeaten start on home soil in 2016-17 (first eight).

The Opta supercomputer has gone in favour of Moyes' men to get the job done here, though the margin is smaller than 10%.

Across its 10,000 pre-match simulations, the Toffees were handed a 41.5% win probability, marginally higher than Spurs' 31.9%.

The likelihood of a draw, which has happened four times in the last nine Premier League fixtures between the two, is 26.7%.

Can Everton preserve their (new) home comforts?

Everton's 133-year stay at Goodison Park ended at the culmination of last season, and they have adapted quickly to life in their new home on the banks of the Mersey. Albeit, performances have not always been convincing.

The Toffees started with a 2-0 win against Brighton back in August, which was followed by back-to-back draws with Aston Villa and West Ham United. 

And they needed a 93rd-minute winner from Jack Grealish to pick up their second league victory at Hill Dickinson Stadium against Palace, continuing their upward trajectory under Moyes. 

Indeed, since the Scot's first game back in charge of Everton in January, only six teams have won more points in the Premier League than the Toffees (42).

But there is still plenty of room for improvement, as demonstrated by last week's defeat to Man City.

Everton have won just one of their last 36 Premier League away games against sides who finished in the top four the previous season, and are winless in 20 (D7 L13) since beating Liverpool 2-0 in February 2021.

However, they are on home soil this time around. And they also have a strong record on Sundays.

The Toffees have won their last five Premier League matches played on Sundays, all under Moyes since he returned to the club earlier this year. They are the only side to play more than twice on a day of the week in 2025 and win every single game on that day.

Moyes' second stint has seen Everton improve in attack, though defensive solidity is still a key requirement for the former West Ham boss.

Of the sides to have played in the Premier League during his tenure (excluding newly promoted teams this season), only Arsenal (19), Man City (27) and Villa (27) have conceded fewer goals than Everton's 28. 

However, Everton have gone five games without a clean sheet in all competitions, though they have not conceded more than twice in a match since losing 4-0 to Manchester United last December, a run of 37 games. It is their longest run without conceding at least three times in a game since between May 1987 and February 1988 (46 games).

That being said, they have been rocked this week by star defender Jarrad Branthwaite, who is yet to play at all this season, sustaining a setback in his return from a hamstring injury, meaning the 23-year-old is likely to be out until early 2026.

Spurs aiming to make first goal count

Having seen Bentancur put them ahead early on at Villa Park last time out, supporters of other clubs may have been confident of going on to claim all three points, but that is something Tottenham fans are yet to become accustomed too.

Since the start of the 2024-25 campaign, no side has lost more Premier League matches when scoring first than Tottenham (eight), while Frank ranks third for this (six defeats) behind Fulham's Marco Silva (eight) and his predecessor at Spurs, Ange Postecoglou (seven).

Across that same period, only Fulham (34) have dropped more points from winning positions than Spurs' 32, which is level with Brentford among top-flight teams. 

Indeed, Villa also enjoyed their first Premier League away win after falling behind in exactly a year (since Oct 19th, 2024 against Fulham), having lost 10 of their previous 11 away league games in which they trailed before facing Spurs (D1).

And though Spurs have thrived away from home this term, they turned in perhaps their most underwhelming performance of Frank's tenure against Monaco on Wednesday, even if they were able to escape with a point. 

But they had Vicario to thank, with the Italian making eight huge saves throughout the contest, with Spurs achieving a result that has not been the norm for them over recent years, mainly under former boss Postecoglou.

The 0-0 draw put an end to Tottenham's run of 125 matches without one across all competitions, with their last goalless draw before this week coming in March 2023 against AC Milan in the Champions League.

There will be concerns for Frank at the top end of the pitch, too. Spurs have failed to score more than two goals in each of their last four Premier League fixtures since a 3-0 away win against West Ham. 

And Spurs will be hoping to find their clinical edge through Richarlison, who has scored five goals in seven Premier League games against his former club Everton. The Brazilian has only netted more against Wolves and Leicester City (both six) in his top-flight career. 

Mohammed Kudus will also be keen to have his say. The attacker has the joint-most assists in the Premier League this season (four, level with Everton's Grealish), while he also recorded team-high totals for chances created (three), crosses (eight) and duels (16) against Monaco. 

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Everton – Iliman Ndiaye

Iliman Ndiaye continues to be the Toffees' most creative outlet in the final third, and with Grealish absent due to not being able to play against his parent club, the Senegal international was excellent against Man City last time out.

Ndiaye set up a great chance for Beto early on and also forced a fine save out of Gianluigi Donnarumma, and was generally a consistent menace for City's defence to deal with.

Only Tottenham's Kudus (64) and Man City's Jeremy Doku (45) have made more dribbles in the Premier League this season than Ndiaye (39).

His 5.2 dribbles per 90 are the most by an Everton player in a season (500+ minutes played) since Moise Kean in 2019-20 (5.6).

Tottenham – Joao Palhinha

Having played a key part in ensuring Spurs took a point away to Monaco in the Champions League, Joao Palhinha will be hoping to have a similarly combative display here.

Indeed, the Portuguese international, who was reportedly a transfer target for Everton early in the summer, has made more tackles (35) than any other player in the Premier League this season.

His 10 tackles in Spurs' defeat to Villa were also the most by a player in a game in 2025-26 and most by a Tottenham midfielder since Sandro (11) against Blackburn Rovers in 2012.