It’s fair to say Youssef Chermiti is a work in progress but evenings like this are crucial to his development in English football.

The center forward for Everton appeared to have a difficult evening ahead of him in the Under-21s’ EFL Trophy match against Mansfield Town for a considerable amount of the game.

But by the same token, for a long time it looked like the teenager was going to be Sean Dyche’s only cash signing of the summer.

It seems though that 6ft 4in Portuguese target men are like buses at Goodison Park though and in the final week of the window, the Blues splashed out a cool £25.8million on Beto.

As a 25-year-old who had netted double figures in both of the previous seasons in Serie A for Udinese, Beto is clearly streets ahead of his younger team-mate on their respective footballing journeys and his arrival has surely been beneficial for all parties in terms of where they need to be. Chermiti cost £15 million, but even though the deal was arranged by director of football Kevin Thelwell, who was present at Field Mill, we have to keep in mind that he is still a very young player still learning his craft.

Before making his major move, he had only made 16 top-flight appearances for Sporting CP in his native country, making him not even an over-age player for Everton’s second string.

In this correspondent’s humble opinion, Chermiti could have led the line for Paul Tait is youthful Blues from the beginning as he learns to adapt to the English game, but he was picked on the third try, which gave their frontline an additional dimension. However, in their previous two matches in the competition, the Blues had been good in possession but somewhat toothless up front.

Even though he displayed an impressive variety of tricks and flicks, demonstrating that he ‘has a good touch for a big man’ (as if any of us are surprised that a player taller than six feet can trap a ball), it is clear that he still has a long way to go before he is ready for the Premier League.

But the rough and tumble presented by these challenges will surely help.

Chermiti had something of a running battle with referee Neil Hair, appearing exasperated for long periods as he was caught offside on numerous occasions and gave away a string of free-kicks for shirt-tugging—even going into the book – but his trials and tribulations eventually paid off.

He’d already gone close a couple of times with a header that was just off target from Halid Djankpata’s cross and then a low shot that was saved by Scott Flinders before his guile in tight areas proved decisive.

With the clock ticking down and the game seemingly heading for penalties as it entered the final minute, Chermiti lured George Cooper into putting his arms around him in the box and Hair pointed to the spot.

Flinders – who had been outstanding between the sticks for the Stags to deny Everton on several occasions – was finally beaten as the youngster from the Azores held his nerve to stroke his effort to the keeper’s left as he dived to the right and slot home the match-winner.

Dyche insisted soon after the signing that there is no pressure on Chermiti at this stage but given his skill and stature, there’s something of the young Dominic Calvert-Lewin about him and 50 Premier League goals later, he didn’t turn out too badly did he?