Koeman’s star quality cannot hide Everton folly of buying in bulk
The club spent £140m in the summer but will struggle to kick on this season because they failed to replace Lukaku and lack star quality
Everton’s majority shareholder, Farhad Moshiri, gave an interview last November in which he spoke about how he hired Ronald Koeman as the club’s manager to compete in the “new Hollywood of football”. By that he meant the Premier League’s big boys in the North-west: Jose Mourinho at Manchester United, Pep Guardiola at Manchester City and Jurgen Klopp across Stanley Park at Liverpool.
The problem for Everton is that they may have brought in a big-name director but they have sold their A-list screen idol. Koeman is in but Romelu Lukaku has not been replaced. They have no star. It already feels like it could be the rerun of other movies: Tottenham Hotspur in 2013 and Liverpool in 2014.
Four years ago, Spurs sold Gareth Bale and signed seven players with the cash they received. It was even likened to trading in Elvis Presley for the Beatles. Each of those seven acquisitions appeared a good signing, in isolation, but it did not work as a whole. Buying in bulk rarely does. Only Christian Eriksen and – when he was fit – Erik Lamela were successful.
Having finished fifth and a point behind
Arsenal in Bale’s last
Three more leading European players are soon expected to announce that they have signed up to Juan Mata’s Common Goal initiative, which involves pledging one per cent of their earnings to charity.
The Manchester United forard was the first big name to commit, followed by Mats Hummels and then the two American female players, Alex Morgan and Megan Rapinoe, with the aim of creating a Common Goal Starting XI and, eventually, involving players, managers and clubs around the world.
The donation is in addition to as irreplaceable.
whatever other charitable work is carried out and is deliberately kept low at one per cent to make it manageable. But, despite Mata being one of the Premier League’s stars – and it being the richest league in the world – it is
disappointing that Mata’s call has so far not led to one British player signing up. Who will be the first?