BENT RE-LIVES STRIKE

Monday 23 August 2004, 11:03

Everton striker Marcus Bent scored his first Premiership goal for the Blues on Saturday and hopes there are a lot more to come in the future.

Bent scored at the ground of one of his former clubs, but was actually relieved to see the linesman's flag stay down when he received the ball from Thomas Gravesen.

"It was nice to get off the mark," he told evertonfc.com.

"Even with ten men we played a nice bit of football leading up to the goal. The ball was played to me from Sandro, I passed it to Tommy (Gravesen) and he played the ball back to me.

"I thought I was offside, a couple of the boys said I was offside, but I didn't stop - I carried on, the 'keeper came out and made it quite hard for me to be honest, but I managed to put it away.

"Before the game, I was going to say to the boys that I have scored nearly every time I've played here. But I didn't because I didn't want to jinx myself!"

The 26-year-old believes that his goal is a timely boost to his self-confidence, but still feels that he has a lot to learn as an Everton player.

"In terms of my confidence, it was good to score," he continued.

"I felt that I played quite well. Occasionally, I did a few silly things which I shouldn't have done, but all in all I thought I contributed well to the team and the result.

"It was nice to score here. I was a bit surprised that I didn't get a good reception from the Palace fans and I was disappointed with that - but I suppose that's football."

The former Blackburn Rovers striker was full of praise for midfielder Thomas Gravesen who bagged a brace in the 3-1 win and also believes that the entire team did well to come back from South London with a victory.

"Tommy had an excellent game," he said.

"He's one of the main players in the team - he took his two goals well - his second goal was fantastic. He told me that I was responsible for pulling three Palace players away from him, so I can take some credit for that.

"All in all, it was a good performance from everyone, especially away from home, which we needed. Everyone expected us to beat Palace, so there was a lot of pressure on us.

"We managed to do a good, professional job, but it's not the best that we're going to play. I am sure we have got a lot more to offer, but it was away from home, a good win and three points."