Everton: Breaking down the 25-man squad

Everton submitted their 25-man squad on Friday for the Premier League season, but which players stood out most on the list?

One of the first orders of business upon completion of the summer transfer window, is for every Premier League club to submit their squad list, comprising of 25 players. As reported by Ben Pringle of the Sunday Express, Everton did just this on Friday.

One of the stipulations of the list, is for it to contain no more than 17 players who aren’t home grown. The Blues were never in any trouble of meeting the eight player minimum who qualified as home grown.

Unless you’re able to foresee the future — or are just telling fibs — the chances are you didn’t successfully predict all 25 members of the squad. In this respect, there were certainly some surprise announcements.

First of all though, let’s start with arguably the most important question of if Ross Barkley was on the 25-man list? Remember that manager Ronald Koeman previously vowed to freeze the midfielder out of the first team, after refusing to sign a new contract.

However, it still shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that Barkley was named in the squad, regardless of his current injury and recent actions. This doesn’t mean he will actually play for Everton and Koeman missed a chance to send a message, by allowing the 23-year old to retain his number 8 shirt.

(Yes, we appreciate Barkley was unlikely to ever lose it. Regardless, it still presented an opportunity to make a point.)

Barkley was one of 14 players who were listed as home grown talent. Most of them are extremely familiar names, including the likes of Wayne Rooney, Jordan Pickford, Michael Keane and Phil Jagielka.

However, one minor surprise was the inclusion of Sam Byrne, who was assigned the number 40 shirt. He arrived from Manchester United in July 2014 and has yet to play for the first team.

Byrne plays at the forward position, which partly explains why Koeman picked him for the squad. Moving away from the home grown players, Everton’s need for striking options resulted in another surprise selection – Oumar Niasse.