Everton are primed for a new era at Bramley Moore.
The bygone Farhad Moshiri chapter is concluded, the page turned. David Moyes’ return and seemingly agreeable start with The Friedkin Group, who have granted him significant transfer powers, beyond that of his predecessors at Everton, suggests real progress could be on the cards.
While Moyes will be looking to add some quality to his first team, he’ll also need to part ways with certain peripheral members.
Everton won’t want to lose too many though. Memories of Anthony Gordon’s start to life at the club, and subsequent departure, are still fresh, with no love lost between the respective parties.
Anthony Gordon's rise at Everton
Cashing in on up-and-coming stars is plainly a part of football. But it can hurt. During Moyes’ first stint as Goodison Park boss, Everton reluctantly sold 18-year-old academy talent Wayne Rooney to Manchester United for £27m.
Likewise, Gordon’s acrimonious force-out in January 2023 was a bitter pill to swallow. Newcastle signed the talented winger for £45m when he was in the fledgling phase of his career, and he is jeered upon every miserable return to his former stomping ground.
After all, the 23-year-old had been at Finch Farm since his formative years, playing regularly for the U18s and U21s before being handed his professional debut by Sam Allardyce – in the Europa League – when he was only 16 years old.
He made 78 appearances for Everton’s first team, scoring just seven goals and providing only eight assists. Still, he was a “frightening” prospect, as hailed by Boreham Wood boss Luke Garrard, and there’s a lingering sense he had plenty more to offer to the club which birthed him.
However, sometimes cashing in is the right thing to do. Indeed, Everton hit gold selling one exciting up-and-comer in 2017, banking the biggest amount of them all.
Everton struck gold with their original Anthony Gordon
Everton’s woes over the past several seasons, skirting close to the dreaded drop zone, are not a by-product of selling one talented young centre-back, even though his sale back in 2016 was a poignant thing.
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And though he’s since forged an illustrious career, a deeper dive corroborates the claim it was the right thing.
John Stones wasn’t a member of Everton’s respected academy, instead signed from Barnsley for just £3m in 2013, when he was only 18 years old.
He’d taken prodigious steps onto the senior stage in the Championship, featuring 22 times in the first half of the 2012/13 season before his move to Merseyside, but had to bide his time until making his name among the seniors.
Curiously, it was Moyes who welcomed him to Everton in the first place.
There’s no question the Scottish tactician has an eye for a top talent, for Stones went on to perform 95 times for Everton before leaving at the tender age of 22.
The money offered by Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City was simply irresistible. City, in the nascent phase of their rebuilding process under the renowned Spaniard, snapped Stones up for a jaw-dropping £50m fee, which made him the most expensive defender in English history.
In just three years, Everton made an incredible £47m profit on a young defender who has since lived up to the hype but has simultaneously been blighted, incessantly, by injury problems.
Remarkably, the 30-year-old is playing out his ninth year with the Citizens and has never hit 30 Premier League appearances in a single campaign.
When considering the 1,567% profit that the Blues banked for this young defender, it’s hard to claim it was a terrible loss, especially when they stayed afloat in the immediate aftermath.
24/25
11 (6)
2
0
23/24*
16 (12)
1
0
22/23*
23 (21)
2
2
21/22*
14 (12)
1
0
20/21*
22 (22)
4
0
19/20
16 (12)
0
0
18/19*
24 (20)
0
0
17/18*
18 (16)
0
0
16/17
27 (23)
0
0
Of course, Stones has won six Premier League titles, the Champions League, and a host of further major honours besides, but Everton must be pretty pleased with their business when looking back, even though Stones was described by Three Lions teammate Ezri Konsa last year as a “world-class” player. At his best, for sure, this is true.
It could have been different. In 2015, one year before Stones moved to Manchester, Everton rejected a transfer request from the young star when Chelsea were looking to snap him up.
Late Everton chairman Bill Kenwright rebuffed three official bids for the Englishman, whose head had been turned, with the third totalling £30m. This proved to be good business since City came calling with even more moneyed words one year later.
In a way, this makes Stones the original Gordon, who also forced his way out of Merseyside. Though Gordon is one of the most talented wingers in the Premier League, he’s hardly missed by his former fanbase.
Given Gordon admitted over eight years after Stones’ sale that a move to Stamford Bridge was “quite close” before he eventually signed for Newcastle, further similarities can be drawn.
Everton cashed in at the perfect time. Stones is a wonderful footballer but his injury problems throughout his career would have seen his stock fall, had he stayed put.
Indeed, the three campaigns following Stones’ sale before the 2016/17 term still hold the record finishes (7th, 8th and 8th) since 2013/14, Roberto Martinez’s maiden season.
Everton might have been wasteful spenders for most of the Moshiri era, but this was one deal that proved worthwhile, with investment turned back toward the likes of Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Idrissa Gueye, and Ashley Williams, who was initially an able replacement, and much cheaper at that.
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