DOMINIC KING: How players slipped through Everton's fingers

DOMINIC KING: How players slipped through Everton’s fingers in an absurd transfer window, with their search for a striker resembling a frantic charge around the shops on Christmas Eve – it is no wonder the fans are FURIOUS

• Everton failed to sign a striker last month despite a pledge from Farhad Moshiri
• Targets Danny Ings, Kevin Schade and Georginio Rutter joined rival clubs
• The failure lies at the feet of those involved in the club’s football operations

It was 9.39pm on Tuesday when Sean Dyche’s jeep rolled out of Finch Farm on to Finch Lane.

It was cold, the wind was whipping off the Mersey estuary but still there was a band of hardy fans waiting for him.

Everton’s new manager had no option but to stop, given the way the group had circled, but was happy to spend a couple of minutes. He scribbled a few autographs, posed for selfies and was sent on his way with cries of ‘good luck’. He will need it.

This pleasant little scene was juxtaposed to all that played out before and after. The very fact there were supporters outside Finch Farm at that time was down to Everton’s inability to sign a striker, a failure that falls at the feet of those involved with the club’s football operations.

A couple of hours earlier, with frustrations having boiled over, one group headed to Finch Farm and unfurled a banner across the green entrance gates condemning Everton’s board as ‘liars’.

New Everton boss Sean Dyche faces a tough task after the club failed to sign a striker

A group of Everton fans unfurled a banner at Finch Farm labelling the board as ‘liars’

The depth of ill feeling and lack of trust for those in power cannot be overstated.

In an interview recorded on January 17, Farhad Moshiri, the club’s majority shareholder, told an Everton Fan Advisory Board member that fears the squad would be weaker by the end of the month were unfounded.

‘We need a striker — we will get one,’ Moshiri said. ‘I have no doubt the second half of the season will be stronger. We have a plan in place in terms of recruitment and performance.’

That plan, increasingly, resembled a frantic charge around the shops on Christmas Eve. You go in with the idea of buying presents, expecting the shelves to be well stocked but realise there is nothing available but tat and chintz, none of which offers quality or value.

Last-minute planning leads to a fiasco and that is the perfect word for this absurd month. It was known in autumn that Everton needed more firepower, with Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s fitness inconsistent, so how have they ended up in this mess?

Everything began in December. Frank Lampard and director of football Kevin Thelwell had decided that Aston Villa’s Danny Ings had everything to come in straight away and provide that presence. Ings was aware of the interest and would have thrown himself into the challenge.

Everton wanted a deal wrapped up so he could be unveiled on January 1, but there was an issue. Thelwell proposed a loan but Villa did not consider that for a second, making it clear the only way business would be done was with a permanent £12million deal. It was a non-starter.

Lampard was keen on other targets. Georginio Rutter, at Hoffenheim, and Kevin Schade, at Freiburg, had been identified, along with Manchester United’s Anthony Elanga. When Thelwell made calls for Rutter and Schade, though, Leeds and Brentford had already tied things up.

Everton offered a loan deal for Danny Ings but the forward joined West Ham permanently 

Kevin Schade was among Everton’s targets but the forward was signed by Brentford

In the meantime, West Ham pressed on with securing Ings. On the same day Moshiri gave his interview about delivering a striker, Ings had agreed personal terms and had a medical, though it did not stop Everton making one final attempt to pilfer him.

There was a bitter irony, then, four days later when the two clubs played each other at the London Stadium, that Ings should be injured in a tackle with Tom Davies, meaning West Ham would not consider letting Michail Antonio join Everton after they had made an enquiry.

Lampard was sacked 48 hours later and that meant Arnaut Danjuma, whom he had helped convince to join the club on loan from Villarreal, pulled out and joined Tottenham, having spent the weekend in the North West.

Options continued to be explored, such as Bologna’s Marko Arnautovic, but in the background there was another issue as Anthony Gordon had made it clear his time as an Everton player was over.

His £40m switch to Newcastle — too late to scratch him as the February pin-up in the 2023 Everton calendar — suggested the club could be bold in the market, but their tight financial constraints meant it was never realistic to expect them to reinvest all that money.

Arnaut Danjuma joined Tottenham after Frank Lampard was sacked as Everton manager

So it all led to the nonsense of January 31, when a flurry of names including Ismaila Sarr, Moussa Dembele, Udinese striker Beto, Rennes winger Kamaldeen Sulemana, Iliman Ndiaye, Jean-Philippe Mateta, Lucas Joao and Olivier Giroud were all linked but none arrived.

Everton have only scored two or more goals in the Premier League twice this season. Teams know that getting the first goal against them can finish a game and this is the environment in which Dyche finds himself.

Everton raised £100m in the last two windows by selling Gordon and Richarlison, whose goals during last season’s run-in against Chelsea, Manchester United, Leicester and Crystal Palace were worth 10 points. 

Without those goals, they would have gone down. Without a goal threat in the second half of the season, this time they may not be so lucky. No wonder Dyche was wished good luck.

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