EFL legend excited about career first against Everton as Doncaster look to capitalise on under-fire Toffees

Billy Sharp may be 38 but is looking forward to a new experience as he prepares to play at Goodison Park for the first time.

The veteran striker will lead the line for Doncaster Rovers when they face Everton in the Carabao Cup second round on Tuesday night – a clash that is live on talkSPORT.

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Sharp has been there and done it – he’s the all-time top goalscorer in the Championship, fifth in the all-time scoring charts in League One and he’s even scored six times in the Premier League after captaining Sheffield United in the top flight.

With Everton playing their last ever season at Goodison Park before moving to their brand new stadium, it means that this is Sharp’s last chance to play at one of English football’s most iconic grounds.

But the striker won’t just be heading to Merseyside for the experience – instead he’ll be hoping to pile misery on the Toffees after the disastrous start to the new season which saw their star players get verbally abused by supporters following their 4-0 hammering at the hands of Tottenham.

In contrast, Doncaster are looking like early promotion candidates in League Two with Sharp confident that the Rovers can cause an upset against Sean Dyche’s side.

Speaking to exclusively to talkSPORT.com, Sharp said: “There’s a lot of excitement because Goodison Park won’t be any longer next season and so even for the likes of myself, I’ve never played there because a few times in the Premier League with Sheffield United I was suspended and injured so I’m looking forward to that.

“Goodison Park is an old, traditional ground where you want to play your football at so to go there and we go there with no illusions that it’s going to be a tough night but if we can perform to our best we can cause an upset.

“We’ve got to try and make sure that Everton don’t get things their own way but we know it’s going to be a tough night and we’ve got to be on our game.

“I think they probably will make changes, but whatever they do, they’ll be strong and the players that do play will be champing at the bit to keep their place in the team in the Premier League.

“They’re trying to find a winning formula and they know that they’ll need to be on their game because we’re going to roll our sleeves up and give it a right good go.

“It’ll be a tough tie but the longer we can stay in the cup tie the better it’ll be for us and the better the chance of us causing an upset.”

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Of course, Doncaster go into the contest with last season’s near miss fresh in the memory.

After taking a first half lead through Joe Ironside, the Yorkshire side were well on track to cause an upset before Beto and Arnaut Danjuma spared the blushes of the Toffees to send them into the third round of the competition.

“The lads who played came away and couldn’t believe that they got beaten so they know they can play in these games and on our night we can give them a game,” Sharp said.

“It’s something where we’re going to have to be right from the kick-off because the first 20 minutes will be important and get their crowd a little bit frustrated, which surely they will be because of their start in the Premier League.

“We know what we’re going there to do. We’re going there under no pressure because everyone is expecting Everton to win but we’re going there to try and cause an upset.”

Should Doncaster manage to see off Everton, they face the prospect of a clash against one of the Premier League’s elite in the third round.

But for Sharp, there’s only one club who he’d be bothered about facing.

He said: “There’s people who will talk about playing at places like Anfield which obviously won’t be far away from where we are tomorrow night.

“For me, if we could play Sheffield United that would be good, but we’ll focus on tomorrow night and if we get through then we can get excited for the draw.

“If you get a home tie then it’s great because you get a home advantage, but if you are going to be away from home then you want a game like Everton where it’s going to be one of the last games ever at Goodison Park in the Carabao Cup so we’ll go and enjoy it and we’re the underdogs so we can see what happens.”

Everton v Doncaster is live on talkSPORT with Sam Matterface and Lucy Ward on Tuesday night