Pavel Nekhaychik escaped down the left flank and as Everton failed to clear their lines properly, BATE’s 31-year-old captain Dmitri Likhtarovich – who had averaged less than a goal every two seasons over his 15-year career – let fly with an unstoppable 25-yard screamer that gave Tim Howard no chance as the American was beaten for the first time in over six-and-a-half hours of football.

Everton then switched to a 3-5-2 formation with Gosling pushing forward to a more natural wide midfield role but further goal-scoring opportunities before the break were then at a premium with the only attempt at an equaliser coming via a close range Cahill effort which was deflected wide following a Yakubu knock-down.

With the heavy rain lashing down on the open bowl of the Dinamo Stadium in the second period, both sides struggled to create openings.

Yakubu, a player who was criticised early in his Everton career for a supposed lack of work-rate, put in a real shift up front as he started for only the second time since his return from injury.

Forced to drift wide, the Nigerian found himself on the left-wing when delivering a lofted cross to Jo but his Brazilian strike partner’s header tamely looped into the grateful arms of Veremko.

Despite understandably still lacking a degree of match-fitness, Yakubu always possesses a scoring threat and he looked set to pull the trigger on 69 minutes only to be clinically scythed down by Igor Shitov who received a yellow card for his challenge.

Justice was done though from the resultant free-kick as Leighton Baines lofted the ball across the BATE area to Marouane Fellaini at the back post and the Belgian midfielder found himself unmarked to nod in his first European goal for the club.

With the Belarusians rattled, Everton pressed forward and were rewarded again on 77 minutes as Cahill gambled on reaching a well-placed header by Bilyaletdinov and dinked the ball over the advancing Veremko into the BATE net.

Having taken the lead Moyes soon decided to give Yakubu a breather and introduced Agard into the fray for only his second appearance after the youngster had been blooded as a late substitute in the Carling Cup tie at Hull eight days earlier.

There were still a couple of anxious moments to endure as BATE continued to press forward but a rasping effort from Yurevich was tipped around the post by Howard as Everton clung on to keep themselves in great shape in Group I ahead of their back-to-back clashes with Portuguese giants Benfica.