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Duncan Ferguson wants Romelu Lukaku to smash his Everton Premier League scoring record out of sight.

Lukaku’s phenomenal four-goal blast against Bournemouth last weekend took him to 59 Premier League goals for Everton. Just one more will draw him level with coach Duncan Ferguson’s club record of 60 top flight strikes - scored in two spells over 12 years.

But Ferguson, who is now helping to hone Lukaku’s skills as a striker, wants him to overtake that mark quickly.

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“Someone said to me that Rom was getting closer to my record of goals and I didn’t even know what it was,” Ferguson said.

“No one tells you about the record until someone is about to beat it. The quicker he does it the better. Rom is a goal machine and hopefully he scores a couple of hundred for us in the next ten years.

“We are working with him every day, but we are just there to facilitate him, massage him. He is top drawer. He can finish off his right and his left. He maybe needs to improve his heading, but he is one of the best I have seen.”

Ferguson spoke at length to The Times’ Paul Joyce in an interview published today - and talked about his reputation which saw him red-carded eight times during his career and handed the nickname Duncan Disorderly.

The Blues coach believes he was misrepresented.

“As far as I am concerned I am a big softie,” he said. “Maybe on the field I was a bit different because that’s when you have your war paint on. It was part and parcel of the game, really, and a lot of it gets blown out of proportion. People just like to talk and the story rolls on and rolls on and rolls on. I didn’t see myself as that person.”

Ferguson is now an enormously valued member of Ronald Koeman’s backroom staff.

He has been handed more responsibility under the Dutch boss, which he relishes, and explained that such was his desire to prove himself at Everton off the pitch he worked for nothing.

“Under the present manager there are less staff than before — there is him, his brother and me — and so there is more work for me to do,” he added. “He’ll give me free rein at times.

“He has been very good to me and given me responsibility which is helping me progress as a coach. For him to allow me to be so close to him is credit to him. Other managers might not have wanted that.

“What I have noticed is that he can be very clinical with his decision-making. He can change formations and personnel. If the player isn’t doing it, he is coming off. The players here know that. I know the modern-day player is more sensitive than we used to be, but the manager makes strong decisions and for the good of the team.”

On his return to Everton he said: “The first years I didn’t get a salary. I just worked as a coach to make myself better and that was great for my development.

“I took on an apprenticeship, if you like, and worked my way up. I just wanted to learn the hard way. I believe as a coach you cannot cut corners. Some people can go in at a higher level and use their name to get a job and then they are quickly out of a job.

“Don’t get me wrong, just because you put in years of development as a coach doesn’t mean you are going to keep your job longer. But it gives you a greater knowledge of how it operates. My grounding has been second to none.”