An interesting summer for Everton so far, in that we have been targeting the right players and look to have a DoF that has the right intentions, despite not quite getting *any* over the line as of yet.
So what's the story?
GK: Pickford, Virginia, Begovic
LB: Mykolenko, Young, Nkounkou, Vinagre
RB: Patterson, Coleman
CB: Tarkowski, Godfrey, Branthwaite, Coady, Mina, Keane, Holgate
CM: Gana, Onana, Garner, Iwobi, Doucoure, Davies, Dele, Gomes, Gbamin
Wingers: McNeil, Gray, Danjuma, Townsend
ST: DCL, Cannon, Maupay, Simms, Kean
Let's look back to last season and the squad from last year first. There are rumours that Thelwell was battling against the owner/Kenwright in terms of players last season and Maupay was a club signing rather than a DoF target. They wanted a player with more experience and he wanted to sign someone from his European target list. Now, Maupay has been a bad signing but I think that's also because he doesn't fit our style of play at all. I have no doubt if he moves to another club that don't expect him to be a main target man he'll be fine, but he should never have been signed to be used in the way we did and I hope they now see that as a we should listen to the DoF in future signing. Aside from that we have sold Simms for a good fee and got Mina off the wage bill who despite being our best CB was on a ridiculous contract. Kean also has left as the mandatory purchase in his Juventus contract was activated.
We have brought in Young to bolster our full back options and I can see him being our starting LB and Danjuma will likely be a starting forward option. Gray is probably going to be on the way out to Fulham but as we play them first and we haven't replaced him we are stalling that deal. I'm sad to see him leave as when he's at his best he's excellent but he's far too inconsistent for his age and if we get 10m ish which is rumoured then that's great for us considering we only bought him for 1.5m.
So who are we targeting or have we been targeting?
Our problem is that we have to be careful with FFP and aren't allowed putting down large initial down payments so we have to be inventive. Our first option and someone we have been tracking since January was Bilal-Toure who ended up at Atalanta. Kudus is someone we have been tracking since last summer but now looks likely to join Brighton and is now out of our price range.
We have been tracking Gnonto since the start of the summer and that looks like it might now get pushed through. He's been liking social media posts with him in an Everton kit and now it seems like Leeds are going to sell. Other loan to buy options are being explored - there are conflicting reports regarding Ekitike at PSG and the two Leicester boys (Daka and Iheanacho). We also have Chermiti being wrapped up now who is a complete out of the blue type signing. There were little to no reports and everything happened fairly quickly. I expect that to be announced today or tomorrow.
Despite not quite getting any over the line before the first game this week I do think we are targeting the right profile of player which gives me hope for the future. I don't expect us to do anything special this season but I think we should have enough about us once players are over the line to finish mid table without a relegation battle. I really don't think Luton or SU have enough to have a chance of staying up so it's basically a battle for 18th and if we get those attacking options in then we have enough experience and quality in CM and defence to be fine.
I think our top targets this summer were Bilal-Toure, Gnonto and Danjuma. If we get the latter two that would be good work but we need to get one more of those B options on top of Chermiti for me to feel happy in our attacking depth. Saying that, Dobbin has been lively in pre-season so I won't be aggrieved if he's a backup option this season.
