Everton: £50 million worth poor investments, big chances missed

Yannick Bolasie and Theo Walcott. Much was expected, a lot was spent and little came back on the field.

Yannick Bolassie

Ronald Koeman paid Crystal Palace £25 million for the winger in August of 2016. Making Bolasie the second most expensive player at Everton after Romelu Lukaku.

A lot was expected but, like Koeman, Bolasie failed to deliver when could get on the pitch. He only played 29 EPL matches and scored two goals with four assists over four assists.

Yes, he had a horrendous knee injury, but that’s a poor return for his transfer fee and his wages. Ancelotti didn’t see a place for Bolasie in his plans, so the DR Congo international went out on loan until his contract ended.

Despite a less-than glorious time at Everton, Bolasie was class defined as his going away tweet showed:

Theo Walcott

Sam Allardyce, another former Everton manager, bought Walcott from Arsenal for £18 million in January of 2018. Another Arsenal winger, is there a trend emerging?

At 28 Walcott came in with a pretty decent resume. He was an England international and seemed like he could get among the goals and he had pace.

At Arsenal, he had scored 65 goals and had 49 assists in 279 EPL matches, including 10 in the season before he joined Everton and 14 in another season for the Gunners. And once again, he didn’t return value for investment.

In 85 games, he 11 goals and nine assists, good numbers for a single season. Walcott did make an impression with Everton supporters when he scored a winning goal in a comeback against Watford in February 2020.

In total, Walcott and Bolasie cost Everton £43 million-plus salary. Walcott earned £100,000 per week at Everton meanwhile Bolasie pocketed £70,000 pwer week.

They returned a total of 14 goals and nine assists. In contrast, Calvert-Lewin scored 16 league goals last season.