Everton went into this clash on the back of just one win since the end of August, while Fulham had snapped a four-game losing streak in the league by beating lowly Wolverhampton Wanderers last week.

However, David Moyes's team responded with a much-improved display.

Idrissa Gueye and Michael Keane scored to secure the points, but the Toffees also had three goals disallowed for offside.

The first of those incidents saw Thierno Barry have a close-range finish ruled out for Iliman Ndiaye drifting beyond the last man in the build-up, before James Tarkowski saw a thumping volley chalked off.

Tarkowski was involved in Everton's opener in first-half stoppage-time as his header bounced off the bar and down to Tim Iroegbunam, whose scuffed effort fell for Gueye to prod home.

Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall saw another marginal offside call go against Everton early in the second half, and although Fulham offered much more after the interval, with substitute Josh King performing brightly, the hosts had the second goal their performance deserved in the 81st minute.

Dewsbury-Hall swung in a corner from which Keane turned home with a combination of his head and shoulder, seeing Everton move up to 11th, four points clear of Fulham heading into the international break.

Marco Silva's Fulham hasnow lost five of its past six league matches, with its sole win in that run coming against Wolves.

With West Ham United beating Burnley, 15th-placed Fulham is now just a point above the bottom three.

"I think we got what we deserved," Silva said.

"We played [well for] the first 20 minutes of the second half – nothing more. It's not good enough at all.

"We didn't cope. It's a moment for us to blame ourselves and look at ourselves in the mirror."

To compound Fulham's frustration, Rodrigo Muniz had to be taken off just 17 minutes after his second-half introduction, with Silva confirming the striker was suffering from injury.

Everton, meanwhile, is back on track after taking just one point from its previous three league outings.

"The win is very much needed. We've been frustrated that we haven't picked up more results lately," goalscorer Keane said.

"I'm very pleased to score. I knew it hit my shoulder and I knew it was safe. We work on set-pieces a hell of a lot and we try and get more goals in the team. One of the targets today was me so I fancied my chances."

Captain James Tarkowski felt it was a thoroughly deserved three points.

"We played really well to be honest and dominated most of the game. We got that clean sheet, finally," he said.

"Lately, we've not scored when we needed to in games and conceded a couple of sloppy goals. The margins are really small at this level but today we got it right."