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

Everton released Joshua King, Theo Walcott, Yannick Bolasie and Muhamed Besic.

It was expected Everton would release Joshua King, Theo Walcott, Yannick Bolasie, and Muhammed Besic on Friday. So it was no surprise, but it did raise questions about Everton’s transfer practices and judgment.

King’s departure was perhaps the most intriguing. He was bought to provide another prong in Everton’s attack, besides Dominic Calvert-Lewin and the slumping Richarlison.

After all he scored 48 Premier League goals in 161 appearances for Bournemouth and Everton had outfought Fulham for the Norwegian international signature.

So the question is, why did the forward, who has pace, only play in bits of 11 matches?

What with Richarlison having his poorest season for Everton and Calvert-Lewin bearing the brunt of scoring goals. Calvert-Lewin’s injury would have seemed a perfect time to King a start. And there’s no doubt his pace would have helped Everton’s turgid play.

According to various reports, other Everton players were impressed with King in training. Then Everton manager Carlo Ancelotti said an injury cost King time, further telling the

Liverpool Echo:

"He didn’t have a possibility to play a lot for my technical decision, because there we have a lot of options. He played some part of the games and was good, I have to say. In training he’s absolutely ok, really serious and really professional. He’s back, he’s in a good condition and ready to play .He played more when we played in a different system, now for the fact we have a lot of midfielders out we’ve changed the shape and so he suffered a little bit more."

That sounds a lot like “manager-speak.” Why did a lack of midfielders mean a forward couldn’t be used?

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.

Muhamed Besic has also been a transfer failure

Muhammed Besic joined Everton in the summer of 2014 from Ferencváros for a fee reportedly around £4.5 million pounds.

It looked like then Everton manager Roberto Martinez had made a steal of a deal. After all, hadn’t Bosnian international Besic marked the GOAT Lionel Messi out of the game in the first half in a World Cup match against Argentina. Messi did score the winning goal.

Martinez told the Daily Mail:

"He marked Messi out of the game in the first half. ‘I first became aware of him as a young boy at Hamburg. He’s a young man with incredible potential."

Besic came in as a defensive midfielder and he seemed suited for the role.

He told the Daily Mail:

"‘I do like to tackle,’. But I am a little bit skinny so I need a bit more weight on me but I will make progress with that in time. ‘I am in the gym a lot, every day doing a little bit. I go at 100 per cent with every tackle. If a yellow card comes then I go slower.’"

Besic made a solid contribution appearing in 23 EPL matches at 37 overall in his first season. Then the injury bug that had been taking a sabbatical at Goodison Park hit again!

He suffered hamstring injuries, then a cruciate ligament injury. In the end, he only played 14 more games for the Toffees in the EPL before leaving on loan. Perhaps, it’s Besic, out of all of these who is the biggest disappointment.

Who has been the biggest flop signing for Everton?