Everton rejected the chance to sign 27 year old Premier League defender due to financial infeasibility

Everton rejected the chance to sign Chelsea defender Antonio Rudiger.

Everton were in dire straits when they found that Mason Holgate and Jarrad Branthwaite would be out for 3 months and 1 month respectively, forcing them to actively seek reinforcements in the central defence. A lot of defenders had been linked including the likes of Jean-Clair Todibo, Kurt Zouma and Fikayo Tomori. In the end, the Toffees managed to sign Ben Godfrey from Norwich City for a fee of £25 million including add-ons.

Godfrey’s Everton debut against Liverpool proved all his doubters wrong who termed him as a Championship quality player. But, there has been a new revelation that while Everton were scrambling to sign a defender, they also stumbled upon the name of Antonio Rudiger from Chelsea.

According to The Athletic, Everton looked into the possibility of signing Antonio Rudiger on loan but ultimately rejected the idea. Chelsea signed Thiago Silva on a free transfer which has seen Rudiger slip down the pecking order.

Frank Lampard once trusted the German as a first choice but recent errors and poor form has seen him lose his position to others like Tomori, Andreas Christensen and Zouma.

The Londoners were open to parting ways with the 27 year old with several teams taking stock of the situation. Everton were one of the teams to look into the opportunity of bringing Antonio Rudiger to Goodison Park on a season long loan. However, the Toffees soon rejected the idea due to the financial infeasibility.

Chelsea’s loan fee demand was set at £5 million with the Blues also asking to cover the entire wages of Rudiger that stands at £150,000 a week. So the approximate total would be £7.2 million in wages plus £5 million loan fee, taking the total sum that would be shelled out for Rudiger to £12.2 million.

This is a whopping fee considering he’d only be here at Everton for one season. Rudiger, no doubt, is a talented defender who’d bolster the central defence but it is illogical to spend such an amount on a loan. Chelsea were very irrational to have such a crazy demand and maybe that is why no other team came in for Rudiger despite showing an interest.

As for Everton, Godfrey looks a potent option who has more capacity and playing years ahead of him when compared to Rudiger. The Englishman can learn and polish his game under one of the best coaches in the world, Carlo Ancelotti.

The Toffees made the right choice to not indulge in the Antonio Rudiger transfer.