Everton Loan Roundup and Analysis (Mid-Season 2019)

Everton have many players out on loan at the moment, this roundup lets you know where they are and how they’re playing.

It’s January and transfer news is almost visible in the air. Everyone is excited for potential newcomers to the team even though that doesn’t appear to be the plan. Despite all the rumours floating around, we can’t forget about our players that are currently under contract but aren’t at the club.

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Everton’s loanees are a mixed bag. We have some proven talents that don’t fit into Silva’s plans for now and may return to the club, we have some promising youth prospects from the academy and we have players that obviously won’t play in an Everton shirt again. Everton has sixteen players on loan at the moment and they fit into one of these three categories for the most part.

We’ll start by looking at the tenured players that may return to the club, then we’ll look at the youth prospects and finally the players that most likely won’t be playing for Everton ever again.

Yannick Bolasie (Aston Villa)

The Congolese winger was brought to Everton by Ronald Koeman in the Summer of 2016 for the staggering price tag of £31 million. He had proven himself as a decent winger in the Premier League but he was far worse than that price tag justified, another example of Koeman’s reckless spending.

After returning from a year-long injury that occurred just a few months into his Everton career, he returned to play for the Blues for the second half of last season. He was a perfectly average winger, not very creative but inoffensive in his play. He simply plugged a gap in the squad at the time, which sums up Sam Allardyce’s tenure at the club.

It’s been much of the same from Bolasie at Villa, he doesn’t often make the first team, having started just seven of the Villain’s twenty-eight league games with an additional twelve appearances from the bench. Being a bench player at a Championship club isn’t a good sign for his future Everton career. He’s scored twice and provided four assists while at Villa which is on par with his previous seasons, Bolasie is certainly not a goalscorer.

Due to his mediocre performance in the Championship and his less offensive-oriented play, Bolasie will likely not play for Everton as long as Silva remains in charge. He’ll still be categorised as a potential return though because there’s always a chance and he hasn’t mentioned anything about leaving the club in the press.

Cuco Martina (Stoke City)

Cuco Martina is another one of Koeman’s acquisitions, thankfully it was on a free transfer after he was released by Southampton at the end of the 2016/17 season. The defender was very mediocre during that season, but this was as expected. He never was going to set the world on fire but he was a solid player during a disappointing period for the club.

At the start of the 2018/19 season, he was loaned out to freshly relegated club Stoke City along with fellow Everton defender Ashley Williams. He’s played much of the same at Stoke, always puts in a decent shift and holds the ball well but can struggle in the air at times. The Potters are struggling in the Championship as many fresh relegations tend to, they sit fourteenth in the table and almost certainly won’t be rejoining the Premier League elite this season.

Cuco will be returning to a Premier League club at the end of the season, though it may be for only a short while. The 29-year-old is approaching his latter playing years and isn’t of sufficient quality to keep skipper Seamus Coleman and talented prospect Jonjoe Kenny out of the side. It’s likely he will be loaned out until his contract expires or more likely will end up in a permanent position at a Championship side.

Muhamed Besic (Middlesbrough)

Besic was once a highly touted prospect among Everton fans and though the hype has dulled a bit, he remains a capable player in the centre of midfield. His Everton career has been hampered by constant injury but he was a dependable player with occasional moments of quality while actively playing in the first team.

He’s been at Middlesbrough ever since January of 2018 and has looked very good there playing as a centre midfielder. Middlesbrough are fifth in the table and Besic is a regular starter, he looks like one of the better midfielders in the Championship at the moment. He likes to play the ball and has a spark of creativity to his game which are both very good assets to have on board.

Out of the three players in this category, Besic is the most likely to return and continue his career at Everton. He is only 26 which means he still has plenty of his career left to play. Being impressive in the Championship isn’t an easy task, there currently is no place for him in the side since Idrissa Gueye and André Gomes will keep him out of the starting team and Tom Davies is a more promising backup for now but it’s not unthinkable that Besic may be given another shot in the team in the future so long as he maintains this good level of play.