Everton took a knife to a gun fight and prevailed thanks to a stoppage-time winner.

Everyone likes a stoppage time goal, as we witnessed at Goodison Park twice in the last week when Everton recorded a pair of important wins – but it’s much sweeter for the Toffees when it’s both a winner and in Manchester!

Both Beto and Lewis Dobbin came off the bench for Sean Dyche’s side in their last two Premier League matches to score their first Premier League goals, but 15 years ago today, Tim Cahill sunk Manchester City in the 92nd minute on a day when the injury-hit visitors couldn’t field a recognised striker.

When Sheikh Mansour’s Abu Dhabi United Group completed their ownership of Everton in August 2008, they had only just begun their path from perennial strugglers to petrodollar-fueled champions of England and, as of this year, Europe.

Despite the fact that Blues manager David Moyes later famously compared competing with their riches to “taking a knife to a gunfight,” his side went into the game six places above City in the table and would finish the season fifth, while Mark Hughes’ troops would finish the season in tenth with three more defeats than victories.

City were able to spearhead their attack with Robinho, their £32.5million signing from Real Madrid on the day they were bought out – a player who would go on to win 100 caps for Brazil – and even name a £19million striker on the bench in the shape of his compatriot and future two-time Everton loan man Jo.

Six days earlier, the Blues thought Joleon Lescott’s second of the afternoon in the 93rd minute had earned them a share of the spoils against home city club Aston Villa, only for Ashley Young – now 38 and still playing for them – to snatch victory with his brace a minute later.

In a similar vein to the current campaign, Moyes’ men were more successful on the road in the first half of 2008/09 and were good value for their sixth away win from their first nine away league matches, a feat not replicated since their 1969/70 title-winning season, even if back-to-back victories over Newcastle United and Chelsea helped redress the balance. Their Australian talisman, whose first Everton goal had been a winner at Manchester City four years earlier – only to be sent off for a second booking for celebrating by partially removing his shirt (he displayed his abdomen while covering his face rather than taking it off completely) – was their inspiration once more.

“Tim Cahill, quite simply, was absolutely magnificent,” Dominic King wrote in the ECHO. There is no getting away from the truth that he has battled for form in recent weeks, which has been aggravated by missed chances against Middlesbrough and Wigan that he would ordinarily have buried with his eyes closed.

“It’s possible that the heel injury he’s been carrying has had a greater impact on him than we realized, so it was encouraging to see Cahill put in a shift of relentless running, pestering, and pressurising.” He established the tone, never allowing Richard Dunne to relax, so it was right that Cahill was the player who rose highest to power Leon Osman’s corner past Joe Hart, causing chaos at the opposite end of the field.”