Ronald Koeman believes the introduction of Romelu Lukaku as a first-half substitute provided Everton with the impetus they needed to help seal his first victory as manager in Saturday's 2-1 win over West Brom.
Gareth McAuley capitalised on slack defending to put West Brom into an early lead at The Hawthorns and Koeman made a bold move to bring on Lukaku in the 38th minute in place of James McCarthy.
"It's a fantastic win because it is always difficult to come to this place, even more so when they go 1-0 up, but we played well," said Koeman.
"It's always hard to play against West Brom, the teams of Tony Pulis, because they have direct play and a lot of tall players and a lot of productivity from set-pieces and they scored from that.
"At 1-0 down we had to change the system. We needed a target man up front and to make the pitch a little bit wider and of course the 1-1 before half-time is vital.
"Lukaku and [debutant Yannick] Bolasie came on and both did well. We finished strong today. We can and must improve, but we are much better than one week ago."
"I am very happy with his performance. He's doing well. Of course he makes some mistakes but that's part of football," the Dutchman said.
"He looks very comfortable in the centre-back position but also in the right-back position. He attacked well and he defended brilliantly, so it's good for the boy."
