One of the major surprises this season has been the excellent prgress of West Ham and in particular the form of loan signing Jesse Lingard. Should Everton have done more to bring him in?
The Manchester United player had been out of favour at Old Trafford for a while now and Everton were a club linked with a possible move for him last year.
In the end the ex-England player went to the London Stadium as David Moyes brought him in to provide additional creativity and goals to his side.
Straight away Lingard hit the ground running and has continued ever since. He’s been outstanding for the Hammers and has played a key role in propelling them up the Premier League to sitting in fourth with a real chance of qualifiying for the Champions League.
In fact Moyes has done a job very similar at West Ham to what he acheived with Everton a few season’s into his reign there.
In his second full season in charge, 2004-05, Moyes secured a Champions League place for the Blues very much against the odds given his limited financial and player resources.
One player who was key to helping acheive this was Tim Cahill. The Australian midfielder was signed from Millwall in the summer of 2004 after making a big impact with the Championship side and proved a hugely shrewd buy over the next decade.
Cahill was a similar type of player to Lingard. He was an ideal link man between midfield and attack creating and scoring goals in particular.
Just like at West Ham now, Moyes used a system then with one centre-forward usually and so the Cahill/Lingaard player was key to making that work along with a hard-working, well-organised side and a generally solid defence.
A player like this is actually probably what the Toffees need now to provide another attacking option. One of the problems Everton have is an over-reliance on their two main forwards Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Richarlison to score goals.
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However, both of them have struggled at times to consistently score goals and it seems dangerous for the team to rely too much on them.
James Rodriguez has also chipped in with a number of goals, although all of his have come at home. And Gylfi Sigurdsson has also contributed a few too.
But while these two are more like number ten types, the Blues don’t have a genuine midfielder who can offer pace, energy and crucially more goals while connecting the midfield and forwards.
The Toffees seem to have plenty of defensive options in midfield with Allan, Abdoulaye Doucoure, Tom Davies and now the finally fit again Jean-Philippe Gbamin. Along with those four, defenders Ben Godfrey and Mason Holgate can also play in the middle.
Gbamin can be key to re-shaping the functioning of the Blues midfield. If Gbamin can stay fit he can operate in that deep-lying position and then perhaps free up Allan and Doucoure to contribute more in the attacking third.
So if Everton do go into the transfer market for another midfielder this summer, then they should be concetrating on finding a player who can offer a reliable goal-threat to support the forwards.