June 13, 2024 • 49 mins
In this episode, we dive deep into Everton's squad performance this season, highlighting standout moments, unexpected breakthroughs, and areas that urgently need attention. We scrutinize the formidable defensive partnership of James Tarkovsky and Jarrad Branthwaite, alongside the persistent struggles at the right-back position. Our discussion also dissects the potential of Amadou Onana and whether his underwhelming performances can be blamed on his own limitations or Sean Dyche's tactical system.
We'll explore the ups and downs of individual players like Dominic Calvert-Lewin and James Garner, as well as the noteworthy improvement of Mykolenko under Dyche's guidance. Nathan Patterson's limited playtime and the utilization of Onana raise some eyebrows, but the team's overall effort, especially in light of behind-the-scenes challenges, receives well-deserved praise. On the transfer front, we evaluate potential reinforcements such as Dwight McNeil, Jack Harrison, and Ashley Young, and discuss strategies to strengthen the squad without breaking the bank.
What financial sacrifices might Everton need to make to move forward? We tackle the complex issue of potentially selling key players like Pickford, Branthwaite, Onana, and Calvert-Lewin to reinvest in the squad. With a focus on strategic decision-making and financial implications, we debate the merits of keeping or selling these assets. Finally, we assess the potential return of Jack Harrison and the critical need for squad depth, wrapping up with cautious optimism about unexpected signings that could boost Everton's prospects. Don't miss this comprehensive analysis of Everton's season and future prospects.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
First of all, I would shout Calvert-Lewin, because he
is.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hello and welcome to episode 74 of the Blues Brothers
Everton podcast.
This is the second of our sortof look back, look ahead season
in review type episodes thatwe're going to do.
We did one focused on SeanDyche and his sort of
performance and what we wantedto see from him.
This one, we're going to lookat the playing squad.
So we're going to don't worry,we will going to look at the
(00:45):
playing squad.
So we're going to don't worry,we will get to the off the field
stuff at some point.
I know that's the thing thatyou're all tuning in to hear our
views on, but we're going totalk about the playing squad, a
little bit of looking back aboutwho we were impressed with, who
we were disappointed in, andthen talking about looking at
the summer transfer window,putting aside the off the field,
(01:06):
what might happen, what ourparameters might be, etc.
Where do we think we need toimprove?
Um.
So I'm in the captain's chairtoday.
Um, austin is not able to joinus, but we do have.
We do have andy andy.
How are you hi?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
ben, I'm good.
Thank you, looking forward touh getting into some good
everton squad discussion.
I've currently sat in uh ourconservatory at home in south
yorkshire looking out at atypically grey English late
spring evening.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Yeah, you can't live in South Yorkshire and complain
about the weather, though.
That seems like you've chosenyour own.
You've made your own choicesthere, haven't you?
Yep, we do have Adam with us aswell.
He's currently on, I think, avideo call with his kids, so he
will be joining us at some point, but currently his little box
(01:50):
on the screen is empty while hechats to the girls.
So he will appear at some point, but until then, andy and I are
going to kick it off and getourselves into the conversation.
So I've already set the stage.
Let's start with performance ofthe squad over last season.
So, andy I'll, I was about tosay I'll throw to you first.
You're the only one here, so Iwill throw to you.
(02:11):
Um, bereft, I am of otherchoices.
Um, tell me, who were youimpressed with, who were you
maybe disappointed in?
General view of the squad squadand their performance over that
season.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Generally, the squad did remarkably well in extremely
difficult circumstances.
You know, going back to somestats on the last pod about like
the XG and things like that,you know the squad of players
(02:47):
overall is quite limited, so itperformed really really well.
In terms of who did well goingfrom back to front, Pickford is
one that definitely did reallywell.
He saved us several times withsaves and saves he made in his
overall display.
(03:08):
One of the most frustratingthings that I find in football
is that this narrative that he'ssome sort of calamity keeper
and the stats just don't backthat up.
Second, I was clean sheets inthe league, Second only to David
Rye.
At Arsenal, we had, I think,the fourth best defensive record
overall.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
And also Andy, but that's clean sheet stat.
That's a lot more fuckingdifficult to do with Everton
than it is with Arsenal.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Because they've got the ball more than we have.
Yeah, absolutely so.
In terms of Hi Adam, by the way, for joining us, hello, hello.
So in terms of hi Adam, by theway, for joining us, hello, yeah
.
So Pickford did well.
Defence did as a whole didreally well.
I mean Tarkovsky andBranthwaite at centre half.
(03:57):
I think they had 13 and 14clean sheets respectively,
something like that.
Why Branthwaite's not gone tothe Euros?
Only Southgate can answer thatquestion, because I'm utterly
mystified by that.
Sheets respectively, somethinglike that.
Why Brantwaite's not gone tothe Euros?
Only Southgate can answer thatquestion, because I'm utterly
mystified by that.
Right back was a problem, soeverybody seemed to have a poke
(04:20):
at it.
There must have been half adozen players that played right
back over the course of theseason.
Nobody really held down a placefor various reasons of injury
and form related to that, butthe defence as a whole was fine.
The midfield is the interestingone for me, because you look at
(04:40):
Onana and he reminds me of ayoung Patrick Vieira in many
ways, in that he can do so muchwith the ball and he's got such
ability to do all different.
He can pass the ball well, hecan run with it.
He can control it.
He's got lots of differentattributes to his game, but we
(05:03):
just really haven't seen any ofthem in a blue shirt, and it was
quite noticeable.
I thought that the games wherehe didn't play the midfield was
perfectly functional without him.
So, as we'll get on to thefuture of the squad in the next
bit of the discussion, he'spossibly one player that we
(05:23):
could arguably, um, arguably, dodo without.
I'm just having a quick lookand let's let's just.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
I want to stay on that for a little bit, actually,
because you touched on it froma a dice point of view and I
don't want to turn this intohaving the same conversation
about dice from a tactical pointof view but like, to what
extent do you think that's onInanna not displaying or not
showing off his ability, or towhat extent do you think that
(05:53):
being a product of the systemand the role he's been asked to
play?
Because I agree with you, Ithink he's one of the best young
midfielders in Europe.
He's probably going to sign forsome Champions League team this
summer and we're going to watchhim be incredible.
So I sort of feel like we mightbe unfairly maligning him
because he's not being given thefreedom to demonstrate his
(06:15):
obvious ability.
But I'm not sure if you agreewith that.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
No, I think if you ask me that question, is it him
or is it him not performing tothe best of his ability, or is
it him performing to the best ofhis ability within the
parameters he's asked to performwithin?
I think it's the latter.
I think if he was in a bit, ifhe, if he was in a side that was
played maybe a bit moreexpansively, he would be able to
(06:44):
display his skill set that muchmore.
So I suppose, to be totallyfair, you could flip around what
I've just said a couple ofminutes ago and say within the
boundaries within which he'sbeen asked to operate, he's done
a perfectly fine job.
That doesn't alter the fact,though, that if they're the
boundaries that Dyche has set,then he's arguably one player
(07:04):
you could sell and get a goodfee for, and the midfield would
function perfectly well withouthim.
I'm personally hoping that hehas a really good Euros, and
that happens because, loathed asI am to want to sell any
Everton player, the realisticfacts are that we're probably
going to have to sell somebodythis summer, so you obviously
(07:26):
want to be selling the ones thatyou can afford to lose, um, and
obviously there's there arecertain players that could
attract a fee.
I'd want I mean fundamentally,first of all you want to keep,
keep the core of the squadtogether.
I'd certainly be looking tokeep Ranthwaite, but Anana is
one you could definitely look tosell, and then just a quick Go
(07:47):
on.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
So no, you go, you go , and then I'll move us on to
talk about transfers as well.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
And then just on the forward line, even though
Calvert-Lewin didn't have themost productive of seasons, he's
still our best forward player,so I'd definitely be looking to
keep him, and I can't seeanybody really coming in for him
with his injury record, thoughI believe he's only got one year
left on his contract.
So Everton need to sort of youknow, decide what they're doing
(08:16):
around that, offer him a newdeal or, if they're not going to
offer him a new deal, then sellhim.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
We have offered him a new deal.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Oh, have we Okay not going to offer him a new deal.
Well, we have offered him a newdeal.
Oh, have we?
Ok?
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Yeah, we've offered him a new deal.
So that is a process ongoing.
He hasn't signed, obviously,but Everton are very clear.
They want to keep it.
But I think you're right.
There is a crunch coming wherewe have to go.
Ok, you're either signing or weneed to cash in now.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Yeah, I mean Beto's been a bit disappointing, so I
think he's not really sort ofshown as much as we all hoped.
And then, conversely, chimitiactually the sort of glimpses we
saw toward the end of theseason were really positive.
He was bright, he was alert, hewas sharp, he put himself about
um, so for a thing, I thinkhe's only 19 or 20, so that
bodes well for the future.
So, overall, to sum up, I'd belooking to keep the core of the
(09:05):
squad as is as much as it'spossible to do.
That If there was anybody thatwe were looking to sell, inanna
would be top of that list and,conversely, I'd definitely be
doing everything we can to keepGerard Brantwaite.
And I suppose one other thingabout Brantwaite is the fact
(09:27):
he's not going to the Eurosmeans that he's going to be out
of the shop window a little bit.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, which may well work in our favour.
That's a good point, adam,welcome.
First of all, sorry forstarting without you, but you
did tell us to, so I'm notreally that sorry.
Sorry for starting without you,but you did tell us to, so I'm
not really that sorry.
We're doing as I said in theintro.
We're just doing the squad ingeneral, so I'll throw to you
(09:54):
who were you impressed with, butalso who were you, because we
had a good season overall and wetalked about it in the last
part.
You know we're happy with howit went, but who didn't live up
to your expectations as well.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I'd be interested in understanding that um, I think,
in terms of players that did youknow, did well, obviously,
pickford being the most thestandout player.
I think I talked on the lastpart about how um everton's
expected goals against washigher than our actual um, the
actual number of goals that weconceded, which indicates that
pickford is making saves, thathe has A.
He's making saves that he hasno right to make.
But also, teams are missingchances.
(10:32):
But over the course of a seasonthat sort of thing becomes a
better indicator of agoalkeeper's quality as opposed
to a team's missing chancesagainst the same team over and
over again.
So, first and foremost,pickford's done again, been
fantastic, and he's as he hasbeen every single season he's
(10:56):
been with us, apart from maybethe first 18 months or so.
So that 18-month period he hadwhere he was a little bit, a
little bit wobbly, but um, sohe's been fantastic.
Obviously, brandon, way it'sbeen, you know, really really
good um.
I disagree with sav gatesomission of him.
Um, I think, particularly withum, uh, with um you know, john
(11:21):
stones's injury.
Now I think having aleft-footed centre-back is
really really important,particularly important in the
modern game.
I sort of understand the reasonwhy he wants Lewis Dunk to be
there, because he's obviouslymore experienced and he's
probably, overall, the betterpasser.
(11:42):
But in terms of that experience, experience can be a, you know,
experience can be sometimesmisunderstood as a synonym for
understanding and quality, and Idon't think he has those.
Necessarily I don't think he'sa better player than Bramfoy.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
The dunk thing.
I find the dunk thing bafflingbecause, like we've watched
Lewis dunk play for England hewas shit Like.
He's played like three times inthe last like couple of
friendlies and he's given awaygoals.
The goal against Brazil I thinkwas his, was his fault, like
there was a goal.
There was another goal againstBelgium, I think he played was
(12:21):
his fault.
So I just like he's experienced.
But this is why we kept JordanHenderson around when he was
fucking useless for a tournament, right like I think we played
was his fault.
So I just I like his experience.
But this is why we kept JordanHenderson around when he was
fucking useless for a tournament, Right Like because it was like
I wanted experience, Like Iwant good players who were going
to win us games.
Lewis Duncan, that like.
And I don't want to turn thisinto like a an England
conversation, but I find keepingdunk over the brand plate just
baffling.
Just baffling because I don'tknow what you're getting.
(12:42):
That's better.
Like I was reading someone Ican't remember who it was but
we're saying like, oh, he'sprobably picked dunk because he
wants somebody who's strong inthe air.
So if you watch jaredbranthwaite this season, you
clown, like it was yeah the, thewhole thing I just find
baffling.
Sorry, adam, I don't want todivert us, but the the
branthwaite over um dunk overbranthwaite thing is one of the
more baffling decisions I thinkSouthgate's ever made, and he's
(13:04):
made some pretty baffling onespreviously.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Yeah, I agree, I think that was a testament to.
It's a testament to BrantWaite's quality and he played a
huge part in our being thefourth best defensive team in
the league as well.
So those two have been standout.
I think.
(13:29):
Calvert-lewin albeit I don'tthink his goals his goal return,
which is three, doesn'tnecessarily refer, sorry, three,
halfway through the season itwas three, I think he ended up
with what about six, I think itwas.
So that didn't reflect becauseat one point he was quite, he
was officially the worst, uh,the worst um converting, strike
converter in the league out oflike 500 players, which shows
(13:52):
you, on the one sense, like hecan't finish his dinner, but on
the other sense, you want yourplayers getting into those
positions which he obviously wasum and those things don't.
You know, players don't misschances, like over and over and
over again, like that he will beputting those chances away.
So carver lewin was a positiveand there's some others, like
(14:13):
you know, that were, that, were,that were good.
I think james garner wasprobably someone who went under
the radar a little bit.
I think he's a nice tidy player.
I don't think I can reallyremember him having a bad game
individually.
Tokovsky as well, fantasticPartnered with Branthwaite.
(14:34):
But I think Mike Kalenka wasprobably our most improved, I'd
say, player.
I think that's a really goodtestament to Dyche's coaching.
I think, ben, obviously youtalked about that in the last
pod, about how much he's he's um, he's improved.
So there's there's some reallygood performanters and I'm
probably underselling some by byomitting them in this sort of.
(14:55):
I've got, I think, a couple ofplayers that were disappointing,
obviously, but like not, andthis is not, and I'll caveat
this now, this is not to saythat they are at fault 100% for
this.
I think it's a mixture of, like, you know, dyche not really
wanting them.
I think for me, I think NathanPatterson's been one that's
disappointing because I thinkthere's been grounds for Dyche's
(15:16):
omission of him, but at thesame time I don't think he's
been played enough.
Anana obviously been talkedabout, I talked about him on the
podcast, so I won't really gointo into, you know, into um,
into detail there, um, but Ithink for me I'm taking it in
the context of our last twoseasons and you know this has
(15:36):
been our best and mostcomfortable season for the last
three.
So for me to like then pick outplayers that have sort of
disappointed.
I'm struggling beyond those twoand I'll say again, I'm not
necessarily being critical ofthose um, individuals.
And just on the anana point, Ithink it's, I think it's, I
(15:57):
think anana could do more.
And I know our dad's you knowthis thing, you know definitely
thinks anana could do more andwishes he would take control of
games.
And I do agree.
I think there's been occasionswhen he hasn't.
I just also think that he'sbeen asked to play in a way that
doesn't necessarily suit hisability, because he's our best,
(16:18):
he's our most progressive passerand he can press well when he's
asked to's asked, when he'sasked to, but I just don't think
he's utilized as well.
So he's been obviously a bit ofa disappointment.
But yeah, I think for me to saylike, yeah, I think me to say
that I'd be picking outindividuals I'm disappointed
(16:39):
with, apart from those two, andthen not and they're definitely
not 100% their fault would beharsh on the squad.
Because I think, given ourcircumstances, particularly
given our circumstances andobviously, ben, you talked about
this on the last podcast aboutDyche being able to write three
books in a single season on theabsolute shit show going on
behind the scenes for Everton toaccumulate what ended up being
(17:02):
48 points with that squad hasbeen fantastic and that's
testament to Dyche and testamentto the players implementing his
style of play.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
Yeah for sure.
And none of this is, as you say, designed to be overly critical
, because I think, generally,the players did a great job.
I mean, we got as many pointsas brighton and they sacked
their manager.
So, like you know, let's, um,let's, let's put it in, put it
into perspective, about where,where we would have ended up had
all things been been equal.
I I want to talk about, I wantto focus on a couple of players
(17:41):
as we talk about transfers,because and maybe this is a
controversial view, because Ithink, essentially and just to
very quickly cover off, I thinkfor me, I think that Michael
Enko would win most improvedplayer.
I was impressed with what DwightMcNeil did.
I think he should be playedmore in the middle, which we
discussed a little bit last week.
(18:03):
I was slightly disappointed inJack Harrison.
To be honest, I would probablystill want him back in some way,
shape or form, because I thinkhe fits the system quite well,
but he didn't contribute as muchin terms of assists and goals
as I necessarily thought hewould when we signed him.
Ashley Young was another onewho I have the great respect for
, but I think his legs have justgone and I just don't think
(18:28):
he's able to operate at thelevel that he needs to operate
to be a Premier League player.
So am I happy to have him backin terms of like, hey, you can
cover a couple of spots thenfine, but I certainly don't want
a situation where I'm having towatch him start at right back
regularly next season so and wecan come on to have potential
salts for that.
But I want to talk about,because you know, staying away
(18:49):
from the off the field stuff.
I think it's fairly clear thatwe will be.
There will be some sale ofplayers in order to take some
profits, in order to reinvestwhether that's to reinvest
because we obviously need tobuild the squad, or whether
that's because we need to hitPSR regulations or whatever.
I think the expectation is thatthere will be some movement of
players.
I think, essentially, webasically have four saleable
(19:13):
assets that we could you couldget a reasonable return from,
and I think actually they runall the way through the spine of
the team.
I think you've got Pickford,you've got Brantwaite, you've
got Anana and then you've gotCalvert-Lewin Let me frame it
this way and, adam, I'll come toyou.
First, you've got to.
Let's play shag.
(19:35):
Marry, push off a cliff.
Right, you've got to.
You don't have to shag any ofthem, don't worry.
You've got to keep two, you'vegot to sell two, you're on,
you're on mute apologies.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
First of all, I would shag Calvert-Lewin because he
is um, dom, if you're listeningthe offer's open um
Speaker 2 (20:08):
but sorry, I the episode.
It's just gone.
Gone all to hell now, becauseeverything, everything is now
going to be overwritten by thefact that Adam would shag
Dominic Calvert-Lewin carry on.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
I mean for the listeners.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
I'm straight, just for context, but just a
testament to my point even you,a straight man, would be willing
to have sex with dominic albertlillian, such are you overawed
by beauty.
Anyway, let's get back on topicquickly yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
So that's a really, that's a really good way of
putting it.
I think if I because you've gotto take it in the context of
like of um can you?
You can ask bigger questions,like can you trust kevin
thalwell to get the get thestrategy right?
And I think that's the firstquestion that you would need to
(21:02):
ask, because that would impacton what you would, who you would
sell, I think, because ifyou're saying that you don't
trust him as much to get itright, would you want to take
away a fundamental basis of?
Do you want to take away afundamental basis of of the
style of play that we have andwhat I'm building on, our
foundations, which are ourdefense, and do you not trust
(21:25):
him?
Then I think you keep ranthawayand pickford based on that um,
because the stats show that thathas been our strength this
season.
It's been the basis of ourstaying up, um, so, um, if you
do have the trust of felwell andyou think that you can trust
(21:48):
him to make, to replace himadequately, and with that comes
a much, much larger amount ofmoney, of course you would sell
before you'd look at sellingbranthwaite, because if you look
at like, if you sell anana,which would be the person I'd
sell in the first scenario, thenobviously we paid.
What was it?
What do we pay?
30, 35 million for him we, yeah, it's.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
There's also some like I think some of that is
like additions and sell-on feesand that sort of, but I think,
yes, the total package isbasically somewhere around that,
but I don't think we'veactually handed that much money
over, yeah, as of yet yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
So we've got like so he's been here for what two?
He's been here two seasons now,hasn't he?
So yeah, I say four-yearcontract.
Let's argument say, say we paid20 million up, 25 million up
front.
So you know, you're looking at7 million, roughly just just shy
of 7 million per season.
We've paid 40 million of it off.
So you've got 40 million leftto pay.
(22:47):
You could probably get.
You could probably then get, Ithink we'd be looking for
anything between 50 and 60million for him.
I think would be a reasonableamount of money.
So you're looking at a profitthere.
You look at a profit there of,like you know, on the face of it
, on the face value of it, ifnearly 100% based on what we
paid.
(23:07):
So that would give us, you know, that would give us what you
know, 20, 30 million to playwith.
And obviously we've got blackholes and we've got holes in our
, in our finances where you know, if there was said that we need
to sell, so we're likely tosell someone, so how much of
that would get reinvested?
Is, you know, is then quite?
(23:28):
Is then question, is isquestionable, and then you'd be
looking at you know, how do wereinvest that?
I think it'd be good to talkabout, like you know, either
either individual players orwhere we can look, what markets
we can look at in.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Yeah, and we will do that.
I just want to just in in thespirit of of getting us there,
because I know we're also dearlistener.
We are tight on, tight on timetoday, unfortunately, so it's
like a tailed episode.
Did anyone disagree that ananawould be the first person that
you would sell?
Because he would be the firstperson I would sell for the
reasons I themselves.
Right, cool, let's.
Let's park anana then, becauseI think it's actually a more
(23:59):
interesting discussion, and,andy, I'll come to you.
We've now, we've all agreedwe're selling anana.
You now have to sell one ofpickford, branthwaite, calvert,
lewin.
Who are you?
Who are you selling?
Speaker 3 (24:12):
definitely not selling jared branthwaite for
Calvert-Lewin.
Who are you selling?
Speaker 2 (24:14):
I'm definitely not selling Jared Brantwaite, for
reasons that I've already saidNow just to open up, even if you
could get, just to play devil'sadvocate, even if someone comes
in and offers you a worldrecord transfer fee for a
defender it's Harry Maguire£85-90 million money.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
If somebody comes in and offers that amount of money,
then I I I quick decision.
Everybody has got a value, youknow, despite saying you're not
going to sell him.
If somebody did come in andoffer that amount of money, then
I probably would sell him forthat amount of money, but I
don't think somebody would no, Iagree, I don't think anyone is,
especially if he isn't going tothe euros.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
But I'm just trying to understand, like, where your
threshold is of where you sellthem.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
So yeah, carry on.
Yeah, if my threshold was thathigh then I would sell him, but
I don't think anybody's going tooffer that amount of money.
Now, just, pickford's a bit ofan interesting one, because I
opened the pod by saying howmany points he's saved us and
how many saves he's made, andwe've discussed his level of
(25:21):
performance many times onprevious pods, but the games
that Jal Virginia played for usthis season I think he only
played maybe a handful of gamesin the League Cup, but he did
enough there to demonstrate tome that he's actually quite a
decent backup.
So again, if somebody came inand offered I don't know £60
(25:46):
million for Jordan Pickford,then the club would have to ask
itself well, could we sellPickford, promote Virginia to
number one and then get somebodyas backup?
And financially that wouldobviously make a lot of sense.
And therefore, losing what iscurrently your number one
(26:07):
goalkeeper might not have thenegative impact that you might
initially think it'd have.
Um, now, do I think somebody'sgoing to offer that much for
fitford?
No, I don't, and he's incontract till 2027, I think.
So, um, he's probably not goingto go anywhere.
(26:28):
I'd still keep calvert lewinbecause I think I think I've
already said not don't want tosell Branthwaite.
I think if it's a toss-upbetween Pickford and
Calvert-Lewin, with the playerswe've got now, replacing
Pickford with Virginia andgetting a backup goalkeeper in
is easier than sellingCalvert-Lewin and trying to get
(26:50):
a replacement forward in atLewin and trying to get a
replacement forward in.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
And this is interesting, right, because it's
good to have theseconversations, because I come
down on entirely the oppositeside of that argument and I'll
explain why, and I think it's aperfectly valid argument.
If you think that you have agoalkeeper inside the club who
can step up and you don't haveto replace him, I get that.
I think if you were to go, ifyou just take the squad as it
(27:14):
was last year and you go, wouldyou rather lose Jordan Pickford
for the season through injuryand have Jalvijinja play the
whole season, or would yourather lose Dominic
Calvert-Lewin and have to playBeto?
I'd much rather lose DominicCalvert-Lewin and play Beto,
because I think, look and thisis touching on the tactic stuff
(27:34):
we talked about last week SeanDyche's way of scoring goals and
way of playing isn't builtaround having like a superstar
player or a, you know, a playerwho does everything or is
transformative to the team.
It's built around havingplayers who understand their
role, do their jobs andtherefore put themselves in
situations where they can scoregoals.
And Beto didn't have theeasiest like entry into English
(27:58):
football, like you've got toremember he's you know, he was
working in KFC not that long ago, right, he obviously loves the
club, he obviously is keen and Ithink there's a lot of ability
there.
Big adjustment coming to thePremier League.
We all remember I mean, look,big adjustment coming to the
Premier League.
We all remember we talked aboutMichael Enko earlier.
He didn't look anywhere nearthe player he does now.
In the first six months If youthink all the way back to
(28:20):
Fellaini we thought we boughtGeorge Ware's cousin for the
first three or four monthsbecause all he seemed to do was
elbow people and get booked thatappeared to be the total range
of his ability and thenobviously transformed into one
of the best midfielders thatwe've, I think, certainly in my
life we've ever had when he was,when he was on his game.
(28:40):
So I for me, I think he'sselling on because I think he
doesn't fit the system.
He has the resale value andthere's interest in him and, to
your point earlier, andy, Ithink he's the easiest one to
take out and go.
Hey, nothing changes here.
Like the system still workswith players we have, with some
additions, are can fill thatvoid.
(29:01):
But I think the second person onthat list is dominic
calvert-lewin, like I think, andI don't think he's sealing in
terms of.
Well, actually, no, I was aboutto say sealing in terms of
finances isn't as high, but Iactually think it might be
because goalkeepers areundervalued.
Right, because you're right,we're not going to get 60
million through Jordan Pickford.
You might get 30, 35, becauseunless you're selling him to
(29:23):
Chelsea, who pay absurd fees forgoalkeepers on a regular basis,
people don't pay huge amountsof money for goalkeepers because
they see them, as you know,less valuable positionally.
So what?
You're getting 30, 35, maybe 40at a push.
I reckon you could get 25, 30for dominic calvert-lewin and I
(29:45):
think losing dominiccalvert-lewin is less damaging
to us, to Adam's point earlier,than losing Jordan Pickford,
because our strength was thedefence last season.
Right, that was what thesolidity and the foundation was.
So if I'm picking two of them,I'm selling Inanna and I'm
selling Dominic Calvert-Lewinbecause I think Beto second
(30:08):
season is a perfectly viablereplacement for Dominic
Calvert-Lewin in the way that wewant to play Like, do I think
his ceiling is as high?
No, but do I think with a goodseason he can get you the eight
to ten goals?
I mean Calvert-Lewin got seventhis year and we know we miss
lots of chances and stuff.
But I think the I think thesquad ends up in a better place
(30:34):
if you sell DominicCalvert-Lewin versus selling
Jordan Pickford, because I thinkwe and there is a danger as
well that we underestimate thedifference between having a
world-class goalkeeper and justa good goalkeeper.
Like we would have gone downtwo of the last three seasons
were it not for Jordan PickfordPossibly three of the last three
seasons I probably think wewould have been safe this year,
(30:58):
just gone.
But I think there is a dangerof going like we have one of the
best goalkeepers in the worldand I think you let go of that.
Very, you have to be reallycareful before you say, actually
we think this guy isreplaceable, so yeah, I would
keep.
I think you keep brand-playunless you get a mega-money
offer.
To be really careful before yousay, actually we think this guy
is replaceable, um, so yeah, Iwould keep.
I think you keep brand waitingwhen you get, unless you get a
(31:19):
mega money offer.
Because the other thing as wellthat plays into this is that I
don't pretend to know how psrworks at all.
I don't think any of us do.
I don't think the premierleague does necessarily.
But dominic calvert lewin was a.
We bought him for what?
1.5 million pounds fromsheffield united way back in the
day, so he's almost pure profit.
Um, in that sense, as isbranthwaite, it's pure profit,
(31:42):
so that might.
That may play into it as well,but I don't know how that works
with pickford because we boughthim for so much money but so
long ago.
I don't know how that's held onour books now, um as in terms
of the investment.
Speaker 1 (31:56):
So yeah, oh, I imagine on that point, I imagine
pickford is basically becausewe signed him in 2017 and he's
obviously signed his.
This is his third contract still, so he's just recently signed,
so I think you could treat himas sort of I mean, we're pure
profit yeah, it is yeah in termsof, like his um, uh, he, what
(32:18):
we, what he will have and whatBrantley and Calvert-Lewin will
have, which is sell-on clausesto Sunderland, carlisle and
Sheffield United respectively.
So you've got to factor that inas well.
But yeah, I thinkaccumulatively Brantley gives us
the most money.
That's fair to say.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
Yeah if it's a purely financial decision, if you're
selling branthwaite rightbecause you're going to have
bought someone for what?
A million pounds and sell himfor 75 million pounds, like that
, that is a that is the bestfinancial outcome.
But the best footballingoutcome, I think is, is you want
to keep branthwaite for as longas possible?
Um, we've got about 15 minutesleft, so I want to keep
(32:59):
Rathwaite for as long aspossible.
We've got about 15 minutes left, so I want to transition us
into talking about the transferwindow and who we want to see
come in.
And that can be.
You know, I play a lot offootball manager, but I'm
currently in the Swedish league,so my knowledge of players that
might be attractive to Evertonin 2024 is relatively limited,
because I'm in 2028 in Sweden.
So, adam, whether it's aparticular player or a
(33:23):
particular position, where doyou think we need to strengthen?
Who would you like to see comein?
Who have we been linked withpotentially that you would view
as a good option?
And then, andy, I'll come toyou on the same question.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
I think it'll all obviously depend on the same
question.
I think, um, it'll allobviously depend on who we end
up selling.
So let's go for, let's go forthe reasonable, let's go that we
sell anana um as a, because Ithink, you, it needs to be
always caveated with who we'regoing to sell um.
But what I would like ingeneral to them some last
podcast.
I would like in general and tothe last podcast I would like to
see more sort of creativity,because the stats all
(33:59):
demonstrate that we lackedcontrol over games.
There's a good graphic I wasreading on a website called the
Analysis a couple of days agoand it showed it basically does
like a, basically a general heatmap of your control of the
pitch where you have more than55 percent of the ball, um,
(34:22):
obviously, manchester cities ispretty much all all blue apart
from, like, the opposition'spenalty area, um, and everton's
is, um, pretty much the opposite.
So what that?
So what that?
So what that is demonstratingis that and that's not
necessarily a bad thing, becausewe're not a possession-based
team, but what it doesdemonstrate is that we are happy
(34:44):
to sort of for the teams tohave the ball and either, you
know, hit them on thecounter-attack, which is not
really something that we try anddo.
We try and win it high and thenlook for set pieces.
So that's our style of play.
So it will be nice to sort ofsee some more creativity because
, particularly after we've lostAndre Gomez, who was probably
our best, our most creativeplayer overall, our most
(35:09):
creative midfielder if you takeMcNeil out the equation in terms
of his set-piece delivery Ithink Gomez's ability to create
chances from open play, in myopinion, was the best out of any
of our midfielders.
So I think it's important thatwe sort of I would like us to
(35:30):
look for a more ball-playingplayer.
Now I'm not sure who that's, I'mnot sure, like individuals,
who's that's going to be.
I think I've said this point inthe past where, unfortunately,
the championship, I don't think,is necessarily the market.
That you can.
You can look as much to as muchand you can get, you know, real
gems if you look carefully, butyou have to pay for them, like
(35:53):
adam wharton obviously went toBlackburn, to Palace and is now
in the England squad for theEuros.
So they are there.
But you sort of have to besmart and you have to pay more
money relative to what we did inthe Jagielka, lescott, tim
Cahill days.
So, yeah, I think defensively,know, defensively, I've got no
(36:16):
issues.
I've got no issues at all.
I would like to see Patterson beworked on over the summer in
terms of to be coached in thesame way Michael Lenko was,
obviously.
He made that point well lastweek, ben.
I think that would be somethingI'd like to see.
Yeah, I think the centre of thepark would be good for me,
because I think you know youkeep Calvert-Lewin, he will
(36:37):
score goals.
I don't think we need a goalscorer.
He's kept himself fit.
I think the idea of Beto beingit's nice to have that
competition and it's reassuringto have that competition for
those times when Calvert-Lewin'stweaked something, you've got
someone who can come in whoisn't Neil Morpay.
Calvert lewin's tweak something, you've got someone who can
(36:58):
come in, um, who isn't neil morepay.
Um, and you know, 90 of mycriticism for neil more pay is
direct, is is put squarely atkevin feltwell, because I think
he was an absolutely astounding,astoundingly bad decision to
try and think that neil more paycan play in the same way that
dominic calvert-Lewin can.
It's just absolutelymind-boggling.
Anyway, yeah, and I think we'reobviously looking at a deal for
(37:23):
Jack Harrison which indicateswe're sort of looking for, you
know, a player who can play outwide, who's, you know, tricky
and can create things.
Obviously he got like fourassists last season and had some
reason, decent chance creationfrom open play as well.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
So, um, yeah, center of the park would be, would be
for me, but, um, I wouldn't beable to um reel off any any um
any names, I'm afraid no, and Iand to be like I don't know I've
got no idea about who thesetargets might be, and actually I
sort of feel like we shouldn'tknow, because if we're doing
(37:59):
this properly, it should beplayers that you know we haven't
necessarily have greatawareness of, because that
suggests we're scouting inplaces that aren't, because we
could all name the PremierLeague midfielders who might fit
our system.
But I sort of hope that KevinThelwell was mining slightly
deeper than that, because who'dhave I mean, adam, you're going
(38:21):
to say that you had, but who'dhave heard of Vitaly Mikhalenko
and Amadou Inanna and Betobefore we signed them right?
And so that's the other elementof not focusing too much on
players.
I think all of those arecorrect.
I would want to see us.
We definitely need to add to themidfield.
(38:42):
I think we've got the talent inthe squad at right back.
I don't think we need to signone, but I really think he needs
to decide whether he can do toNathan Passon what he did with
Mikalenko, and then, if he can't, we may need to buy one there,
and then we are woefully shortof pace out in the attacking
position.
So, whatever we do, I think youhave to be adding players who
(39:04):
have a degree of pace, the oneplayer I would put a not
insignificant amount of money on.
Having said that, I don'treally know players.
It would astonish me if wedidn't sign Josh Brownhill, who
is the Burnley captain, who isout of contract and played for
Dyche for a number of years whenhe was at Burnley, and so a
(39:25):
free transfer from Burnley,who's familiar with the system,
just makes too much sense not tohappen.
So if I was placing my chip onan individual player, it would
be Josh Brownhill.
Andy, where do you think weneed to strengthen?
Who do we need to target?
Speaker 3 (39:40):
Well, like you, I couldn't say many names that
could sort of fit particularpositions.
I've got quite a few thoughtson right back, because I do
think that's more of a slightlyproblem position than maybe you
you believe it is.
I agree, this is the summerwhere he needs to.
(40:01):
The club needs to decidewhether Patterson is capable of
playing right back in thatsystem going forward and he's
the number one right back.
Or if he isn't, then quitefrankly, quite he could be on
the to-sell list and getsomebody else in.
Because if you look at theplayers who've played right back
so far this season, obviouslyPatterson did Coleman Garner,
(40:26):
Ashley Young, Ben Godfrey so tohave that number of players in
that one position, it's clearlya problem.
So yeah, a decision has to bemade.
I mean because we've oftenmused on this pod throughout the
season why Dyche wasn't playingPatterson, even when he was
(40:49):
fifth.
The number of times he was onthe bench was quite high.
So, for whatever reason, doeshe not fancy him?
For some reason Does he notthink he can play in the system?
Is he not capable of doing whatDyche wants him to do?
So a decision has to be madethere Either work with Patterson
, like he's worked withMikulenko, or if he doesn't want
(41:10):
to do that or thinks thatPatterson isn't capable of doing
that, then I'd add him to thelist of people who you would
shag, marry or push off a cliff,sell and get somebody else in.
Secondly, I agree 100% with theprevious comments about having
(41:31):
some more creativity in midfield, Because even if an Arnold
doesn't go, you're still goingto need some more creativity and
some more pace in there.
And then let's be realistic,Beyond that, there's arguably
not a huge amount that we'regoing to be in a position to do.
(41:54):
Obviously, we're going to talkoff the field stuff, possibly in
the next pod, so much of whatwe may do between now and the
start of next season is going tobe dependent on that.
But as we sit here now thesquad we're not going to be
capable of spending huge amountsof money on the squad, Because
even if we sell Inana for alarge amount of money, a chunk
(42:14):
of that you'd imagine might gotowards complying with the next
set of PSR rules.
So, being realistic, for methere's two positions creativity
midfield and potentially aright back if Dyche decides that
he can't make patterns, and theright back that he wants him to
(42:37):
be.
Speaker 2 (42:40):
Do you think we should?
I think we're all like Dan Jumadidn't work out, so I don't
think there's any prospect ofthat.
Like, we've touched on JackHarrison a little bit but,
andrew, would you want to seeJack Harrison back?
Would you want to do that on aloan, a permanent transfer?
Like obviously Leeds didn't getpromoted, which I think was
helpful to that, because itmeans that if he wants to play
(43:02):
Premier League football, they'renot going to want him back in
that sense, and there might be afinancial incentive for them to
get rid.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
But yeah, let me know what you think about that, yeah
, I thought Harrison did enoughthis season to warrant at least
exploring the possibility of apermanent transfer.
I mean, I'd read various bitsabout Leeds failing to get
promoted as apparently being notgreat at all for their finances
(43:30):
.
They sort of budgeted ongetting promoted and that's
clearly not happened.
So I've no idea if they need tosell players or not, I don't
know, but you'd imagine thatthem not getting promoted means
that there's more likelihoodthat players will want to leave
(43:50):
disappointed.
If we, if we explored thepossibility of signing Jack
Harrison on a permanent transferwhether he offers enough
creativity to fulfill themidfield role I've just outlined
for me needs filling possibly,possibly not.
You might sign him as a sort ofgood squad player and then you
(44:12):
might need some more creativityon top.
But I wouldn't.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
I'd certainly be looking to get Harrison back in
one form or another yeah, Iagree with that because I think
squad player is exactly thephrase that I was thinking of in
that sense because if you lookat you know I saw a thing on on
Twitter the other day which wasbasically looking at our squad
now that the loans have gone andpeople out of contract have
left.
It is incredibly threadbare.
(44:37):
Good backup up frontcentre-backs are okay.
Quality you can question alittle bit.
We basically have one left-backand then Ashley Young if he
signs.
We have one right-back and thenSeamus Coleman slash Ashley
Young if they sign.
Centre midfield we have four nowthat Garner's signed on,
(44:59):
basically and Gomez is gone.
So not a huge amount of depththere.
But our wingers we basicallyhave Dwight McNeil and Lewis
Dobbin, because we had Dan Jumaand Harris.
For the way Dyche wants to play, we need two or three players
who can function in thosepositions.
So I think if you can getharrison back on a finance, on a
(45:21):
deal that works financially, Ithink you almost have to,
because you're only going to begoing and getting somebody else
to be a squad player in thatposition.
So if you're going to getsomebody else, why wouldn't you
get jack harrison?
In addition, because he canplay on both sides.
We know if it's the system, weknow he, we know he likes him,
like, so I would, I would.
I'm all in favor of a deal forfor jack harrison.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
Um that works financially for for everton yeah
, I think that's, yeah, I thinkthat's, um, that's sensible,
yeah, so it's sort of a bitscary when you put it, when you
put it like in terms of thesquad yeah well, I, I hadn't
even.
It's sort of a bit scary whenyou put it like that in terms of
the squad.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
I hadn't even appreciated it until I saw this
and then you realise that, yeah,harrison was on loan, dan Juma
was on loan, and then we hadMcNeil and Dobbin and we were
actually incredibly lucky thatwe got through the season and
didn't really have anysignificant injury problems.
I know we talked about Calvert,calvert low in missing a couple
of games or whatever, butgenerally we were able to roll
(46:20):
out the same side on a fairlyregular basis and when players
miss games, it was one or twogames.
We didn't have any like, hey,this person's out for three
months because and if we had,especially in those areas, we
would have been in a lot oftrouble because we just have no
depth and that is a, you know, astory of chronic years of
(46:42):
mismanagement which we will getinto when we're talking about
the off the field stuff.
But yeah, we are a squad inneed of, like, free, cheap,
available players which are noteasy to come by.
Yeah, and with that, any morefor any more, anything we want
to um, we've got 60 secondsanything anyone wants to bring
(47:02):
up I'm, I'm quite excited, youknow, like remember when we like
signed phil neville and it justcame out of the blue.
Speaker 1 (47:09):
Yeah, I'm just, I can just see that happening and
it's quite, it's like.
It's like almost like quitereassuring or comforting because
we've got no money.
We'll sign, we'll sign, we'llsign, we will sign some players,
I imagine, who the fuck knowswho they're gonna be.
It's quite good, it's nice yeahno it is.
(47:29):
It's being linked with everynumber 10 in the under the sun
in summer of 2007 yeah, we are.
Speaker 2 (47:35):
We are essentially those people who, who had a, a
perfectly nice, comfortablehouse, won the lottery, didn't
know what the fuck to do, so endup moving back into their own
original house with theirslightly shitty sofa, but that's
, that's really comfortable.
And and then they're like, oh,this is actually what I wanted
all along, like we are actuallybetter when we don't have any
(47:57):
money.
It's a more comforting place,it's like a nice hug, like, oh,
we're shit and don't have anymoney.
This feels like home.
Um, that's, uh, that's that's.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
That's how old beams and terrestrial telling yeah
yeah, exactly like we're.
Speaker 2 (48:11):
Just we're partying like it's 1995 around here, um,
so, yeah, uh, we're gonna wrapup there, um, slightly shorter
episode today.
But, uh, thank you guys forjoining um and thank you to our
listeners for uh, listening.
We've put, we'll put this oneout and then we're going to do
one more on the off the season.
Um, we're trying to leave thatone as long as possible in case
(48:32):
there is a resolution that forus to talk about.
But we may just have to bitethe bullet and talk about all of
the rumours.
But keep an eye out on yourpodcast feeds for that.
Like, subscribe, share withyour Everton fans, everton
friends, so we can grow ourlistener base and we will see
you again soon.
Thank you very much you.
First of all, I would shout Calvert-Lewin, because he
is.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hello and welcome to episode 74 of the Blues Brothers
Everton podcast.
This is the second of our sortof look back, look ahead season
in review type episodes thatwe're going to do.
We did one focused on SeanDyche and his sort of
performance and what we wantedto see from him.
This one, we're going to lookat the playing squad.
So we're going to don't worry,we will going to look at the
(00:45):
playing squad.
So we're going to don't worry,we will get to the off the field
stuff at some point.
I know that's the thing thatyou're all tuning in to hear our
views on, but we're going totalk about the playing squad, a
little bit of looking back aboutwho we were impressed with, who
we were disappointed in, andthen talking about looking at
the summer transfer window,putting aside the off the field,
(01:06):
what might happen, what ourparameters might be, etc.
Where do we think we need toimprove?
Um.
So I'm in the captain's chairtoday.
Um, austin is not able to joinus, but we do have.
We do have andy andy.
How are you hi?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
ben, I'm good.
Thank you, looking forward touh getting into some good
everton squad discussion.
I've currently sat in uh ourconservatory at home in south
yorkshire looking out at atypically grey English late
spring evening.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Yeah, you can't live in South Yorkshire and complain
about the weather, though.
That seems like you've chosenyour own.
You've made your own choicesthere, haven't you?
Yep, we do have Adam with us aswell.
He's currently on, I think, avideo call with his kids, so he
will be joining us at some point, but currently his little box
(01:50):
on the screen is empty while hechats to the girls.
So he will appear at some point, but until then, andy and I are
going to kick it off and getourselves into the conversation.
So I've already set the stage.
Let's start with performance ofthe squad over last season.
So, andy I'll, I was about tosay I'll throw to you first.
You're the only one here, so Iwill throw to you.
(02:11):
Um, bereft, I am of otherchoices.
Um, tell me, who were youimpressed with, who were you
maybe disappointed in?
General view of the squad squadand their performance over that
season.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Generally, the squad did remarkably well in extremely
difficult circumstances.
You know, going back to somestats on the last pod about like
the XG and things like that,you know the squad of players
(02:47):
overall is quite limited, so itperformed really really well.
In terms of who did well goingfrom back to front, Pickford is
one that definitely did reallywell.
He saved us several times withsaves and saves he made in his
overall display.
(03:08):
One of the most frustratingthings that I find in football
is that this narrative that he'ssome sort of calamity keeper
and the stats just don't backthat up.
Second, I was clean sheets inthe league, Second only to David
Rye.
At Arsenal, we had, I think,the fourth best defensive record
overall.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
And also Andy, but that's clean sheet stat.
That's a lot more fuckingdifficult to do with Everton
than it is with Arsenal.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Because they've got the ball more than we have.
Yeah, absolutely so.
In terms of Hi Adam, by the way, for joining us, hello, hello.
So in terms of hi Adam, by theway, for joining us, hello, yeah
.
So Pickford did well.
Defence did as a whole didreally well.
I mean Tarkovsky andBranthwaite at centre half.
(03:57):
I think they had 13 and 14clean sheets respectively,
something like that.
Why Branthwaite's not gone tothe Euros?
Only Southgate can answer thatquestion, because I'm utterly
mystified by that.
Sheets respectively, somethinglike that.
Why Brantwaite's not gone tothe Euros?
Only Southgate can answer thatquestion, because I'm utterly
mystified by that.
Right back was a problem, soeverybody seemed to have a poke
(04:20):
at it.
There must have been half adozen players that played right
back over the course of theseason.
Nobody really held down a placefor various reasons of injury
and form related to that, butthe defence as a whole was fine.
The midfield is the interestingone for me, because you look at
(04:40):
Onana and he reminds me of ayoung Patrick Vieira in many
ways, in that he can do so muchwith the ball and he's got such
ability to do all different.
He can pass the ball well, hecan run with it.
He can control it.
He's got lots of differentattributes to his game, but we
(05:03):
just really haven't seen any ofthem in a blue shirt, and it was
quite noticeable.
I thought that the games wherehe didn't play the midfield was
perfectly functional without him.
So, as we'll get on to thefuture of the squad in the next
bit of the discussion, he'spossibly one player that we
(05:23):
could arguably, um, arguably, dodo without.
I'm just having a quick lookand let's let's just.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
I want to stay on that for a little bit, actually,
because you touched on it froma a dice point of view and I
don't want to turn this intohaving the same conversation
about dice from a tactical pointof view but like, to what
extent do you think that's onInanna not displaying or not
showing off his ability, or towhat extent do you think that
(05:53):
being a product of the systemand the role he's been asked to
play?
Because I agree with you, Ithink he's one of the best young
midfielders in Europe.
He's probably going to sign forsome Champions League team this
summer and we're going to watchhim be incredible.
So I sort of feel like we mightbe unfairly maligning him
because he's not being given thefreedom to demonstrate his
(06:15):
obvious ability.
But I'm not sure if you agreewith that.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
No, I think if you ask me that question, is it him
or is it him not performing tothe best of his ability, or is
it him performing to the best ofhis ability within the
parameters he's asked to performwithin?
I think it's the latter.
I think if he was in a bit, ifhe, if he was in a side that was
played maybe a bit moreexpansively, he would be able to
(06:44):
display his skill set that muchmore.
So I suppose, to be totallyfair, you could flip around what
I've just said a couple ofminutes ago and say within the
boundaries within which he'sbeen asked to operate, he's done
a perfectly fine job.
That doesn't alter the fact,though, that if they're the
boundaries that Dyche has set,then he's arguably one player
(07:04):
you could sell and get a goodfee for, and the midfield would
function perfectly well withouthim.
I'm personally hoping that hehas a really good Euros, and
that happens because, loathed asI am to want to sell any
Everton player, the realisticfacts are that we're probably
going to have to sell somebodythis summer, so you obviously
(07:26):
want to be selling the ones thatyou can afford to lose, um, and
obviously there's there arecertain players that could
attract a fee.
I'd want I mean fundamentally,first of all you want to keep,
keep the core of the squadtogether.
I'd certainly be looking tokeep Ranthwaite, but Anana is
one you could definitely look tosell, and then just a quick Go
(07:47):
on.
Speaker 2 (07:48):
So no, you go, you go , and then I'll move us on to
talk about transfers as well.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
And then just on the forward line, even though
Calvert-Lewin didn't have themost productive of seasons, he's
still our best forward player,so I'd definitely be looking to
keep him, and I can't seeanybody really coming in for him
with his injury record, thoughI believe he's only got one year
left on his contract.
So Everton need to sort of youknow, decide what they're doing
(08:16):
around that, offer him a newdeal or, if they're not going to
offer him a new deal, then sellhim.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
We have offered him a new deal.
Speaker 3 (08:23):
Oh, have we Okay not going to offer him a new deal.
Well, we have offered him a newdeal.
Oh, have we?
Ok?
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Yeah, we've offered him a new deal.
So that is a process ongoing.
He hasn't signed, obviously,but Everton are very clear.
They want to keep it.
But I think you're right.
There is a crunch coming wherewe have to go.
Ok, you're either signing or weneed to cash in now.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
Yeah, I mean Beto's been a bit disappointing, so I
think he's not really sort ofshown as much as we all hoped.
And then, conversely, chimitiactually the sort of glimpses we
saw toward the end of theseason were really positive.
He was bright, he was alert, hewas sharp, he put himself about
um, so for a thing, I thinkhe's only 19 or 20, so that
bodes well for the future.
So, overall, to sum up, I'd belooking to keep the core of the
(09:05):
squad as is as much as it'spossible to do.
That If there was anybody thatwe were looking to sell, inanna
would be top of that list and,conversely, I'd definitely be
doing everything we can to keepGerard Brantwaite.
And I suppose one other thingabout Brantwaite is the fact
(09:27):
he's not going to the Eurosmeans that he's going to be out
of the shop window a little bit.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, which may well work in our favour.
That's a good point, adam,welcome.
First of all, sorry forstarting without you, but you
did tell us to, so I'm notreally that sorry.
Sorry for starting without you,but you did tell us to, so I'm
not really that sorry.
We're doing as I said in theintro.
We're just doing the squad ingeneral, so I'll throw to you
(09:54):
who were you impressed with, butalso who were you, because we
had a good season overall and wetalked about it in the last
part.
You know we're happy with howit went, but who didn't live up
to your expectations as well.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I'd be interested in understanding that um, I think,
in terms of players that did youknow, did well, obviously,
pickford being the most thestandout player.
I think I talked on the lastpart about how um everton's
expected goals against washigher than our actual um, the
actual number of goals that weconceded, which indicates that
pickford is making saves, thathe has A.
He's making saves that he hasno right to make.
But also, teams are missingchances.
(10:32):
But over the course of a seasonthat sort of thing becomes a
better indicator of agoalkeeper's quality as opposed
to a team's missing chancesagainst the same team over and
over again.
So, first and foremost,pickford's done again, been
fantastic, and he's as he hasbeen every single season he's
(10:56):
been with us, apart from maybethe first 18 months or so.
So that 18-month period he hadwhere he was a little bit, a
little bit wobbly, but um, sohe's been fantastic.
Obviously, brandon, way it'sbeen, you know, really really
good um.
I disagree with sav gatesomission of him.
Um, I think, particularly withum, uh, with um you know, john
(11:21):
stones's injury.
Now I think having aleft-footed centre-back is
really really important,particularly important in the
modern game.
I sort of understand the reasonwhy he wants Lewis Dunk to be
there, because he's obviouslymore experienced and he's
probably, overall, the betterpasser.
(11:42):
But in terms of that experience, experience can be a, you know,
experience can be sometimesmisunderstood as a synonym for
understanding and quality, and Idon't think he has those.
Necessarily I don't think he'sa better player than Bramfoy.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
The dunk thing.
I find the dunk thing bafflingbecause, like we've watched
Lewis dunk play for England hewas shit Like.
He's played like three times inthe last like couple of
friendlies and he's given awaygoals.
The goal against Brazil I thinkwas his, was his fault, like
there was a goal.
There was another goal againstBelgium, I think he played was
(12:21):
his fault.
So I just like he's experienced.
But this is why we kept JordanHenderson around when he was
fucking useless for a tournament, right like I think we played
was his fault.
So I just I like his experience.
But this is why we kept JordanHenderson around when he was
fucking useless for a tournament, Right Like because it was like
I wanted experience, Like Iwant good players who were going
to win us games.
Lewis Duncan, that like.
And I don't want to turn thisinto like a an England
conversation, but I find keepingdunk over the brand plate just
baffling.
Just baffling because I don'tknow what you're getting.
(12:42):
That's better.
Like I was reading someone Ican't remember who it was but
we're saying like, oh, he'sprobably picked dunk because he
wants somebody who's strong inthe air.
So if you watch jaredbranthwaite this season, you
clown, like it was yeah the, thewhole thing I just find
baffling.
Sorry, adam, I don't want todivert us, but the the
branthwaite over um dunk overbranthwaite thing is one of the
more baffling decisions I thinkSouthgate's ever made, and he's
(13:04):
made some pretty baffling onespreviously.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Yeah, I agree, I think that was a testament to.
It's a testament to BrantWaite's quality and he played a
huge part in our being thefourth best defensive team in
the league as well.
So those two have been standout.
I think.
(13:29):
Calvert-lewin albeit I don'tthink his goals his goal return,
which is three, doesn'tnecessarily refer, sorry, three,
halfway through the season itwas three, I think he ended up
with what about six, I think itwas.
So that didn't reflect becauseat one point he was quite, he
was officially the worst, uh,the worst um converting, strike
converter in the league out oflike 500 players, which shows
(13:52):
you, on the one sense, like hecan't finish his dinner, but on
the other sense, you want yourplayers getting into those
positions which he obviously wasum and those things don't.
You know, players don't misschances, like over and over and
over again, like that he will beputting those chances away.
So carver lewin was a positiveand there's some others, like
(14:13):
you know, that were, that, were,that were good.
I think james garner wasprobably someone who went under
the radar a little bit.
I think he's a nice tidy player.
I don't think I can reallyremember him having a bad game
individually.
Tokovsky as well, fantasticPartnered with Branthwaite.
(14:34):
But I think Mike Kalenka wasprobably our most improved, I'd
say, player.
I think that's a really goodtestament to Dyche's coaching.
I think, ben, obviously youtalked about that in the last
pod, about how much he's he's um, he's improved.
So there's there's some reallygood performanters and I'm
probably underselling some by byomitting them in this sort of.
(14:55):
I've got, I think, a couple ofplayers that were disappointing,
obviously, but like not, andthis is not, and I'll caveat
this now, this is not to saythat they are at fault 100% for
this.
I think it's a mixture of, like, you know, dyche not really
wanting them.
I think for me, I think NathanPatterson's been one that's
disappointing because I thinkthere's been grounds for Dyche's
(15:16):
omission of him, but at thesame time I don't think he's
been played enough.
Anana obviously been talkedabout, I talked about him on the
podcast, so I won't really gointo into, you know, into um,
into detail there, um, but Ithink for me I'm taking it in
the context of our last twoseasons and you know this has
(15:36):
been our best and mostcomfortable season for the last
three.
So for me to like then pick outplayers that have sort of
disappointed.
I'm struggling beyond those twoand I'll say again, I'm not
necessarily being critical ofthose um, individuals.
And just on the anana point, Ithink it's, I think it's, I
(15:57):
think anana could do more.
And I know our dad's you knowthis thing, you know definitely
thinks anana could do more andwishes he would take control of
games.
And I do agree.
I think there's been occasionswhen he hasn't.
I just also think that he'sbeen asked to play in a way that
doesn't necessarily suit hisability, because he's our best,
(16:18):
he's our most progressive passerand he can press well when he's
asked to's asked, when he'sasked to, but I just don't think
he's utilized as well.
So he's been obviously a bit ofa disappointment.
But yeah, I think for me to saylike, yeah, I think me to say
that I'd be picking outindividuals I'm disappointed
(16:39):
with, apart from those two, andthen not and they're definitely
not 100% their fault would beharsh on the squad.
Because I think, given ourcircumstances, particularly
given our circumstances andobviously, ben, you talked about
this on the last podcast aboutDyche being able to write three
books in a single season on theabsolute shit show going on
behind the scenes for Everton toaccumulate what ended up being
(17:02):
48 points with that squad hasbeen fantastic and that's
testament to Dyche and testamentto the players implementing his
style of play.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
Yeah for sure.
And none of this is, as you say, designed to be overly critical
, because I think, generally,the players did a great job.
I mean, we got as many pointsas brighton and they sacked
their manager.
So, like you know, let's, um,let's, let's put it in, put it
into perspective, about where,where we would have ended up had
all things been been equal.
I I want to talk about, I wantto focus on a couple of players
(17:41):
as we talk about transfers,because and maybe this is a
controversial view, because Ithink, essentially and just to
very quickly cover off, I thinkfor me, I think that Michael
Enko would win most improvedplayer.
I was impressed with what DwightMcNeil did.
I think he should be playedmore in the middle, which we
discussed a little bit last week.
(18:03):
I was slightly disappointed inJack Harrison.
To be honest, I would probablystill want him back in some way,
shape or form, because I thinkhe fits the system quite well,
but he didn't contribute as muchin terms of assists and goals
as I necessarily thought hewould when we signed him.
Ashley Young was another onewho I have the great respect for
, but I think his legs have justgone and I just don't think
(18:28):
he's able to operate at thelevel that he needs to operate
to be a Premier League player.
So am I happy to have him backin terms of like, hey, you can
cover a couple of spots thenfine, but I certainly don't want
a situation where I'm having towatch him start at right back
regularly next season so and wecan come on to have potential
salts for that.
But I want to talk about,because you know, staying away
(18:49):
from the off the field stuff.
I think it's fairly clear thatwe will be.
There will be some sale ofplayers in order to take some
profits, in order to reinvestwhether that's to reinvest
because we obviously need tobuild the squad, or whether
that's because we need to hitPSR regulations or whatever.
I think the expectation is thatthere will be some movement of
players.
I think, essentially, webasically have four saleable
(19:13):
assets that we could you couldget a reasonable return from,
and I think actually they runall the way through the spine of
the team.
I think you've got Pickford,you've got Brantwaite, you've
got Anana and then you've gotCalvert-Lewin Let me frame it
this way and, adam, I'll come toyou.
First, you've got to.
Let's play shag.
(19:35):
Marry, push off a cliff.
Right, you've got to.
You don't have to shag any ofthem, don't worry.
You've got to keep two, you'vegot to sell two, you're on,
you're on mute apologies.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
First of all, I would shag Calvert-Lewin because he
is um, dom, if you're listeningthe offer's open um
Speaker 2 (20:08):
but sorry, I the episode.
It's just gone.
Gone all to hell now, becauseeverything, everything is now
going to be overwritten by thefact that Adam would shag
Dominic Calvert-Lewin carry on.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
I mean for the listeners.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
I'm straight, just for context, but just a
testament to my point even you,a straight man, would be willing
to have sex with dominic albertlillian, such are you overawed
by beauty.
Anyway, let's get back on topicquickly yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
So that's a really, that's a really good way of
putting it.
I think if I because you've gotto take it in the context of
like of um can you?
You can ask bigger questions,like can you trust kevin
thalwell to get the get thestrategy right?
And I think that's the firstquestion that you would need to
(21:02):
ask, because that would impacton what you would, who you would
sell, I think, because ifyou're saying that you don't
trust him as much to get itright, would you want to take
away a fundamental basis of?
Do you want to take away afundamental basis of of the
style of play that we have andwhat I'm building on, our
foundations, which are ourdefense, and do you not trust
(21:25):
him?
Then I think you keep ranthawayand pickford based on that um,
because the stats show that thathas been our strength this
season.
It's been the basis of ourstaying up, um, so, um, if you
do have the trust of felwell andyou think that you can trust
(21:48):
him to make, to replace himadequately, and with that comes
a much, much larger amount ofmoney, of course you would sell
before you'd look at sellingbranthwaite, because if you look
at like, if you sell anana,which would be the person I'd
sell in the first scenario, thenobviously we paid.
What was it?
What do we pay?
30, 35 million for him we, yeah, it's.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
There's also some like I think some of that is
like additions and sell-on feesand that sort of, but I think,
yes, the total package isbasically somewhere around that,
but I don't think we'veactually handed that much money
over, yeah, as of yet yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
So we've got like so he's been here for what two?
He's been here two seasons now,hasn't he?
So yeah, I say four-yearcontract.
Let's argument say, say we paid20 million up, 25 million up
front.
So you know, you're looking at7 million, roughly just just shy
of 7 million per season.
We've paid 40 million of it off.
So you've got 40 million leftto pay.
(22:47):
You could probably get.
You could probably then get, Ithink we'd be looking for
anything between 50 and 60million for him.
I think would be a reasonableamount of money.
So you're looking at a profitthere.
You look at a profit there of,like you know, on the face of it
, on the face value of it, ifnearly 100% based on what we
paid.
(23:07):
So that would give us, you know, that would give us what you
know, 20, 30 million to playwith.
And obviously we've got blackholes and we've got holes in our
, in our finances where you know, if there was said that we need
to sell, so we're likely tosell someone, so how much of
that would get reinvested?
Is, you know, is then quite?
(23:28):
Is then question, is isquestionable, and then you'd be
looking at you know, how do wereinvest that?
I think it'd be good to talkabout, like you know, either
either individual players orwhere we can look, what markets
we can look at in.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Yeah, and we will do that.
I just want to just in in thespirit of of getting us there,
because I know we're also dearlistener.
We are tight on, tight on timetoday, unfortunately, so it's
like a tailed episode.
Did anyone disagree that ananawould be the first person that
you would sell?
Because he would be the firstperson I would sell for the
reasons I themselves.
Right, cool, let's.
Let's park anana then, becauseI think it's actually a more
(23:59):
interesting discussion, and,andy, I'll come to you.
We've now, we've all agreedwe're selling anana.
You now have to sell one ofpickford, branthwaite, calvert,
lewin.
Who are you?
Who are you selling?
Speaker 3 (24:12):
definitely not selling jared branthwaite for
Calvert-Lewin.
Who are you selling?
Speaker 2 (24:14):
I'm definitely not selling Jared Brantwaite, for
reasons that I've already saidNow just to open up, even if you
could get, just to play devil'sadvocate, even if someone comes
in and offers you a worldrecord transfer fee for a
defender it's Harry Maguire£85-90 million money.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
If somebody comes in and offers that amount of money,
then I I I quick decision.
Everybody has got a value, youknow, despite saying you're not
going to sell him.
If somebody did come in andoffer that amount of money, then
I probably would sell him forthat amount of money, but I
don't think somebody would no, Iagree, I don't think anyone is,
especially if he isn't going tothe euros.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
But I'm just trying to understand, like, where your
threshold is of where you sellthem.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
So yeah, carry on.
Yeah, if my threshold was thathigh then I would sell him, but
I don't think anybody's going tooffer that amount of money.
Now, just, pickford's a bit ofan interesting one, because I
opened the pod by saying howmany points he's saved us and
how many saves he's made, andwe've discussed his level of
(25:21):
performance many times onprevious pods, but the games
that Jal Virginia played for usthis season I think he only
played maybe a handful of gamesin the League Cup, but he did
enough there to demonstrate tome that he's actually quite a
decent backup.
So again, if somebody came inand offered I don't know £60
(25:46):
million for Jordan Pickford,then the club would have to ask
itself well, could we sellPickford, promote Virginia to
number one and then get somebodyas backup?
And financially that wouldobviously make a lot of sense.
And therefore, losing what iscurrently your number one
(26:07):
goalkeeper might not have thenegative impact that you might
initially think it'd have.
Um, now, do I think somebody'sgoing to offer that much for
fitford?
No, I don't, and he's incontract till 2027, I think.
So, um, he's probably not goingto go anywhere.
(26:28):
I'd still keep calvert lewinbecause I think I think I've
already said not don't want tosell Branthwaite.
I think if it's a toss-upbetween Pickford and
Calvert-Lewin, with the playerswe've got now, replacing
Pickford with Virginia andgetting a backup goalkeeper in
is easier than sellingCalvert-Lewin and trying to get
(26:50):
a replacement forward in atLewin and trying to get a
replacement forward in.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
And this is interesting, right, because it's
good to have theseconversations, because I come
down on entirely the oppositeside of that argument and I'll
explain why, and I think it's aperfectly valid argument.
If you think that you have agoalkeeper inside the club who
can step up and you don't haveto replace him, I get that.
I think if you were to go, ifyou just take the squad as it
(27:14):
was last year and you go, wouldyou rather lose Jordan Pickford
for the season through injuryand have Jalvijinja play the
whole season, or would yourather lose Dominic
Calvert-Lewin and have to playBeto?
I'd much rather lose DominicCalvert-Lewin and play Beto,
because I think, look and thisis touching on the tactic stuff
(27:34):
we talked about last week SeanDyche's way of scoring goals and
way of playing isn't builtaround having like a superstar
player or a, you know, a playerwho does everything or is
transformative to the team.
It's built around havingplayers who understand their
role, do their jobs andtherefore put themselves in
situations where they can scoregoals.
And Beto didn't have theeasiest like entry into English
(27:58):
football, like you've got toremember he's you know, he was
working in KFC not that long ago, right, he obviously loves the
club, he obviously is keen and Ithink there's a lot of ability
there.
Big adjustment coming to thePremier League.
We all remember I mean, look,big adjustment coming to the
Premier League.
We all remember we talked aboutMichael Enko earlier.
He didn't look anywhere nearthe player he does now.
In the first six months If youthink all the way back to
(28:20):
Fellaini we thought we boughtGeorge Ware's cousin for the
first three or four monthsbecause all he seemed to do was
elbow people and get booked thatappeared to be the total range
of his ability and thenobviously transformed into one
of the best midfielders thatwe've, I think, certainly in my
life we've ever had when he was,when he was on his game.
(28:40):
So I for me, I think he'sselling on because I think he
doesn't fit the system.
He has the resale value andthere's interest in him and, to
your point earlier, andy, Ithink he's the easiest one to
take out and go.
Hey, nothing changes here.
Like the system still workswith players we have, with some
additions, are can fill thatvoid.
(29:01):
But I think the second person onthat list is dominic
calvert-lewin, like I think, andI don't think he's sealing in
terms of.
Well, actually, no, I was aboutto say sealing in terms of
finances isn't as high, but Iactually think it might be
because goalkeepers areundervalued.
Right, because you're right,we're not going to get 60
million through Jordan Pickford.
You might get 30, 35, becauseunless you're selling him to
(29:23):
Chelsea, who pay absurd fees forgoalkeepers on a regular basis,
people don't pay huge amountsof money for goalkeepers because
they see them, as you know,less valuable positionally.
So what?
You're getting 30, 35, maybe 40at a push.
I reckon you could get 25, 30for dominic calvert-lewin and I
(29:45):
think losing dominiccalvert-lewin is less damaging
to us, to Adam's point earlier,than losing Jordan Pickford,
because our strength was thedefence last season.
Right, that was what thesolidity and the foundation was.
So if I'm picking two of them,I'm selling Inanna and I'm
selling Dominic Calvert-Lewinbecause I think Beto second
(30:08):
season is a perfectly viablereplacement for Dominic
Calvert-Lewin in the way that wewant to play Like, do I think
his ceiling is as high?
No, but do I think with a goodseason he can get you the eight
to ten goals?
I mean Calvert-Lewin got seventhis year and we know we miss
lots of chances and stuff.
But I think the I think thesquad ends up in a better place
(30:34):
if you sell DominicCalvert-Lewin versus selling
Jordan Pickford, because I thinkwe and there is a danger as
well that we underestimate thedifference between having a
world-class goalkeeper and justa good goalkeeper.
Like we would have gone downtwo of the last three seasons
were it not for Jordan PickfordPossibly three of the last three
seasons I probably think wewould have been safe this year,
(30:58):
just gone.
But I think there is a dangerof going like we have one of the
best goalkeepers in the worldand I think you let go of that.
Very, you have to be reallycareful before you say, actually
we think this guy isreplaceable, so yeah, I would
keep.
I think you keep brand-playunless you get a mega-money
offer.
To be really careful before yousay, actually we think this guy
is replaceable, um, so yeah, Iwould keep.
I think you keep brand waitingwhen you get, unless you get a
(31:19):
mega money offer.
Because the other thing as wellthat plays into this is that I
don't pretend to know how psrworks at all.
I don't think any of us do.
I don't think the premierleague does necessarily.
But dominic calvert lewin was a.
We bought him for what?
1.5 million pounds fromsheffield united way back in the
day, so he's almost pure profit.
Um, in that sense, as isbranthwaite, it's pure profit,
(31:42):
so that might.
That may play into it as well,but I don't know how that works
with pickford because we boughthim for so much money but so
long ago.
I don't know how that's held onour books now, um as in terms
of the investment.
Speaker 1 (31:56):
So yeah, oh, I imagine on that point, I imagine
pickford is basically becausewe signed him in 2017 and he's
obviously signed his.
This is his third contract still, so he's just recently signed,
so I think you could treat himas sort of I mean, we're pure
profit yeah, it is yeah in termsof, like his um, uh, he, what
(32:18):
we, what he will have and whatBrantley and Calvert-Lewin will
have, which is sell-on clausesto Sunderland, carlisle and
Sheffield United respectively.
So you've got to factor that inas well.
But yeah, I thinkaccumulatively Brantley gives us
the most money.
That's fair to say.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
Yeah if it's a purely financial decision, if you're
selling branthwaite rightbecause you're going to have
bought someone for what?
A million pounds and sell himfor 75 million pounds, like that
, that is a that is the bestfinancial outcome.
But the best footballingoutcome, I think is, is you want
to keep branthwaite for as longas possible?
Um, we've got about 15 minutesleft, so I want to keep
(32:59):
Rathwaite for as long aspossible.
We've got about 15 minutes left, so I want to transition us
into talking about the transferwindow and who we want to see
come in.
And that can be.
You know, I play a lot offootball manager, but I'm
currently in the Swedish league,so my knowledge of players that
might be attractive to Evertonin 2024 is relatively limited,
because I'm in 2028 in Sweden.
So, adam, whether it's aparticular player or a
(33:23):
particular position, where doyou think we need to strengthen?
Who would you like to see comein?
Who have we been linked withpotentially that you would view
as a good option?
And then, andy, I'll come toyou on the same question.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
I think it'll all obviously depend on the same
question.
I think, um, it'll allobviously depend on who we end
up selling.
So let's go for, let's go forthe reasonable, let's go that we
sell anana um as a, because Ithink, you, it needs to be
always caveated with who we'regoing to sell um.
But what I would like ingeneral to them some last
podcast.
I would like in general and tothe last podcast I would like to
see more sort of creativity,because the stats all
(33:59):
demonstrate that we lackedcontrol over games.
There's a good graphic I wasreading on a website called the
Analysis a couple of days agoand it showed it basically does
like a, basically a general heatmap of your control of the
pitch where you have more than55 percent of the ball, um,
(34:22):
obviously, manchester cities ispretty much all all blue apart
from, like, the opposition'spenalty area, um, and everton's
is, um, pretty much the opposite.
So what that?
So what that?
So what that is demonstratingis that and that's not
necessarily a bad thing, becausewe're not a possession-based
team, but what it doesdemonstrate is that we are happy
(34:44):
to sort of for the teams tohave the ball and either, you
know, hit them on thecounter-attack, which is not
really something that we try anddo.
We try and win it high and thenlook for set pieces.
So that's our style of play.
So it will be nice to sort ofsee some more creativity because
, particularly after we've lostAndre Gomez, who was probably
our best, our most creativeplayer overall, our most
(35:09):
creative midfielder if you takeMcNeil out the equation in terms
of his set-piece delivery Ithink Gomez's ability to create
chances from open play, in myopinion, was the best out of any
of our midfielders.
So I think it's important thatwe sort of I would like us to
(35:30):
look for a more ball-playingplayer.
Now I'm not sure who that's, I'mnot sure, like individuals,
who's that's going to be.
I think I've said this point inthe past where, unfortunately,
the championship, I don't think,is necessarily the market.
That you can.
You can look as much to as muchand you can get, you know, real
gems if you look carefully, butyou have to pay for them, like
(35:53):
adam wharton obviously went toBlackburn, to Palace and is now
in the England squad for theEuros.
So they are there.
But you sort of have to besmart and you have to pay more
money relative to what we did inthe Jagielka, lescott, tim
Cahill days.
So, yeah, I think defensively,know, defensively, I've got no
(36:16):
issues.
I've got no issues at all.
I would like to see Patterson beworked on over the summer in
terms of to be coached in thesame way Michael Lenko was,
obviously.
He made that point well lastweek, ben.
I think that would be somethingI'd like to see.
Yeah, I think the centre of thepark would be good for me,
because I think you know youkeep Calvert-Lewin, he will
(36:37):
score goals.
I don't think we need a goalscorer.
He's kept himself fit.
I think the idea of Beto beingit's nice to have that
competition and it's reassuringto have that competition for
those times when Calvert-Lewin'stweaked something, you've got
someone who can come in whoisn't Neil Morpay.
Calvert lewin's tweak something, you've got someone who can
(36:58):
come in, um, who isn't neil morepay.
Um, and you know, 90 of mycriticism for neil more pay is
direct, is is put squarely atkevin feltwell, because I think
he was an absolutely astounding,astoundingly bad decision to
try and think that neil more paycan play in the same way that
dominic calvert-Lewin can.
It's just absolutelymind-boggling.
Anyway, yeah, and I think we'reobviously looking at a deal for
(37:23):
Jack Harrison which indicateswe're sort of looking for, you
know, a player who can play outwide, who's, you know, tricky
and can create things.
Obviously he got like fourassists last season and had some
reason, decent chance creationfrom open play as well.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
So, um, yeah, center of the park would be, would be
for me, but, um, I wouldn't beable to um reel off any any um
any names, I'm afraid no, and Iand to be like I don't know I've
got no idea about who thesetargets might be, and actually I
sort of feel like we shouldn'tknow, because if we're doing
(37:59):
this properly, it should beplayers that you know we haven't
necessarily have greatawareness of, because that
suggests we're scouting inplaces that aren't, because we
could all name the PremierLeague midfielders who might fit
our system.
But I sort of hope that KevinThelwell was mining slightly
deeper than that, because who'dhave I mean, adam, you're going
(38:21):
to say that you had, but who'dhave heard of Vitaly Mikhalenko
and Amadou Inanna and Betobefore we signed them right?
And so that's the other elementof not focusing too much on
players.
I think all of those arecorrect.
I would want to see us.
We definitely need to add to themidfield.
(38:42):
I think we've got the talent inthe squad at right back.
I don't think we need to signone, but I really think he needs
to decide whether he can do toNathan Passon what he did with
Mikalenko, and then, if he can't, we may need to buy one there,
and then we are woefully shortof pace out in the attacking
position.
So, whatever we do, I think youhave to be adding players who
(39:04):
have a degree of pace, the oneplayer I would put a not
insignificant amount of money on.
Having said that, I don'treally know players.
It would astonish me if wedidn't sign Josh Brownhill, who
is the Burnley captain, who isout of contract and played for
Dyche for a number of years whenhe was at Burnley, and so a
(39:25):
free transfer from Burnley,who's familiar with the system,
just makes too much sense not tohappen.
So if I was placing my chip onan individual player, it would
be Josh Brownhill.
Andy, where do you think weneed to strengthen?
Who do we need to target?
Speaker 3 (39:40):
Well, like you, I couldn't say many names that
could sort of fit particularpositions.
I've got quite a few thoughtson right back, because I do
think that's more of a slightlyproblem position than maybe you
you believe it is.
I agree, this is the summerwhere he needs to.
(40:01):
The club needs to decidewhether Patterson is capable of
playing right back in thatsystem going forward and he's
the number one right back.
Or if he isn't, then quitefrankly, quite he could be on
the to-sell list and getsomebody else in.
Because if you look at theplayers who've played right back
so far this season, obviouslyPatterson did Coleman Garner,
(40:26):
Ashley Young, Ben Godfrey so tohave that number of players in
that one position, it's clearlya problem.
So yeah, a decision has to bemade.
I mean because we've oftenmused on this pod throughout the
season why Dyche wasn't playingPatterson, even when he was
(40:49):
fifth.
The number of times he was onthe bench was quite high.
So, for whatever reason, doeshe not fancy him?
For some reason Does he notthink he can play in the system?
Is he not capable of doing whatDyche wants him to do?
So a decision has to be madethere Either work with Patterson
, like he's worked withMikulenko, or if he doesn't want
(41:10):
to do that or thinks thatPatterson isn't capable of doing
that, then I'd add him to thelist of people who you would
shag, marry or push off a cliff,sell and get somebody else in.
Secondly, I agree 100% with theprevious comments about having
(41:31):
some more creativity in midfield, Because even if an Arnold
doesn't go, you're still goingto need some more creativity and
some more pace in there.
And then let's be realistic,Beyond that, there's arguably
not a huge amount that we'regoing to be in a position to do.
(41:54):
Obviously, we're going to talkoff the field stuff, possibly in
the next pod, so much of whatwe may do between now and the
start of next season is going tobe dependent on that.
But as we sit here now thesquad we're not going to be
capable of spending huge amountsof money on the squad, Because
even if we sell Inana for alarge amount of money, a chunk
(42:14):
of that you'd imagine might gotowards complying with the next
set of PSR rules.
So, being realistic, for methere's two positions creativity
midfield and potentially aright back if Dyche decides that
he can't make patterns, and theright back that he wants him to
(42:37):
be.
Speaker 2 (42:40):
Do you think we should?
I think we're all like Dan Jumadidn't work out, so I don't
think there's any prospect ofthat.
Like, we've touched on JackHarrison a little bit but,
andrew, would you want to seeJack Harrison back?
Would you want to do that on aloan, a permanent transfer?
Like obviously Leeds didn't getpromoted, which I think was
helpful to that, because itmeans that if he wants to play
(43:02):
Premier League football, they'renot going to want him back in
that sense, and there might be afinancial incentive for them to
get rid.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
But yeah, let me know what you think about that, yeah
, I thought Harrison did enoughthis season to warrant at least
exploring the possibility of apermanent transfer.
I mean, I'd read various bitsabout Leeds failing to get
promoted as apparently being notgreat at all for their finances
(43:30):
.
They sort of budgeted ongetting promoted and that's
clearly not happened.
So I've no idea if they need tosell players or not, I don't
know, but you'd imagine thatthem not getting promoted means
that there's more likelihoodthat players will want to leave
(43:50):
disappointed.
If we, if we explored thepossibility of signing Jack
Harrison on a permanent transferwhether he offers enough
creativity to fulfill themidfield role I've just outlined
for me needs filling possibly,possibly not.
You might sign him as a sort ofgood squad player and then you
(44:12):
might need some more creativityon top.
But I wouldn't.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
I'd certainly be looking to get Harrison back in
one form or another yeah, Iagree with that because I think
squad player is exactly thephrase that I was thinking of in
that sense because if you lookat you know I saw a thing on on
Twitter the other day which wasbasically looking at our squad
now that the loans have gone andpeople out of contract have
left.
It is incredibly threadbare.
(44:37):
Good backup up frontcentre-backs are okay.
Quality you can question alittle bit.
We basically have one left-backand then Ashley Young if he
signs.
We have one right-back and thenSeamus Coleman slash Ashley
Young if they sign.
Centre midfield we have four nowthat Garner's signed on,
(44:59):
basically and Gomez is gone.
So not a huge amount of depththere.
But our wingers we basicallyhave Dwight McNeil and Lewis
Dobbin, because we had Dan Jumaand Harris.
For the way Dyche wants to play, we need two or three players
who can function in thosepositions.
So I think if you can getharrison back on a finance, on a
(45:21):
deal that works financially, Ithink you almost have to,
because you're only going to begoing and getting somebody else
to be a squad player in thatposition.
So if you're going to getsomebody else, why wouldn't you
get jack harrison?
In addition, because he canplay on both sides.
We know if it's the system, weknow he, we know he likes him,
like, so I would, I would.
I'm all in favor of a deal forfor jack harrison.
Speaker 1 (45:44):
Um that works financially for for everton yeah
, I think that's, yeah, I thinkthat's, um, that's sensible,
yeah, so it's sort of a bitscary when you put it, when you
put it like in terms of thesquad yeah well, I, I hadn't
even.
It's sort of a bit scary whenyou put it like that in terms of
the squad.
Speaker 2 (45:57):
I hadn't even appreciated it until I saw this
and then you realise that, yeah,harrison was on loan, dan Juma
was on loan, and then we hadMcNeil and Dobbin and we were
actually incredibly lucky thatwe got through the season and
didn't really have anysignificant injury problems.
I know we talked about Calvert,calvert low in missing a couple
of games or whatever, butgenerally we were able to roll
(46:20):
out the same side on a fairlyregular basis and when players
miss games, it was one or twogames.
We didn't have any like, hey,this person's out for three
months because and if we had,especially in those areas, we
would have been in a lot oftrouble because we just have no
depth and that is a, you know, astory of chronic years of
(46:42):
mismanagement which we will getinto when we're talking about
the off the field stuff.
But yeah, we are a squad inneed of, like, free, cheap,
available players which are noteasy to come by.
Yeah, and with that, any morefor any more, anything we want
to um, we've got 60 secondsanything anyone wants to bring
(47:02):
up I'm, I'm quite excited, youknow, like remember when we like
signed phil neville and it justcame out of the blue.
Speaker 1 (47:09):
Yeah, I'm just, I can just see that happening and
it's quite, it's like.
It's like almost like quitereassuring or comforting because
we've got no money.
We'll sign, we'll sign, we'llsign, we will sign some players,
I imagine, who the fuck knowswho they're gonna be.
It's quite good, it's nice yeahno it is.
(47:29):
It's being linked with everynumber 10 in the under the sun
in summer of 2007 yeah, we are.
Speaker 2 (47:35):
We are essentially those people who, who had a, a
perfectly nice, comfortablehouse, won the lottery, didn't
know what the fuck to do, so endup moving back into their own
original house with theirslightly shitty sofa, but that's
, that's really comfortable.
And and then they're like, oh,this is actually what I wanted
all along, like we are actuallybetter when we don't have any
(47:57):
money.
It's a more comforting place,it's like a nice hug, like, oh,
we're shit and don't have anymoney.
This feels like home.
Um, that's, uh, that's that's.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
That's how old beams and terrestrial telling yeah
yeah, exactly like we're.
Speaker 2 (48:11):
Just we're partying like it's 1995 around here, um,
so, yeah, uh, we're gonna wrapup there, um, slightly shorter
episode today.
But, uh, thank you guys forjoining um and thank you to our
listeners for uh, listening.
We've put, we'll put this oneout and then we're going to do
one more on the off the season.
Um, we're trying to leave thatone as long as possible in case
(48:32):
there is a resolution that forus to talk about.
But we may just have to bitethe bullet and talk about all of
the rumours.
But keep an eye out on yourpodcast feeds for that.
Like, subscribe, share withyour Everton fans, everton
friends, so we can grow ourlistener base and we will see
you again soon.
Thank you very much you.
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.