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Vitalii Mykolenko still wakes up every day and has to make a nervous phone call to his parents.

The Everton defender will get in touch with mum, Olesia, and dad, Sergei, to check if they’ve made it through the night unscathed at their home near Kyiv.

And as bombs continue to land on Ukraine soil, Mykolenko is never sure what news he will get when he makes that call every morning before training.

None more so than WBA, WBO and WBC heavyweight king Oleksandr Usyk.

“I think he’s the best sportsman at the moment in Ukraine, the best boxer in the world,” said Mykolenko.

Now there’s a chess club at Finch Farm and at the hotel pre-match with Mykolenko the grandmaster.

“Then before we played Peterborough, in the hotel we played for five minutes and I beat Michael Keane and Joao Virginia,” said Mykolenko, who is also into carp fishing and rarely watches football.

Everton will hope to brush off the Bournemouth defeat and maintain their winning run in the league to strike a blow to their neighbour’s title hopes as well as steer themselves closer to safety.

Club captain Seamus Coleman summed up the mood change at Everton when talking about Mykolenko.

“Seamus said to me, ‘Myko you’re smiling, it’s good when Myko is smiling’,” said the Ukraine left-back.

The smile will stay there if Everton beat Liverpool tomorrow.
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