Everton will push on with striker targets after strengthening the spine of their side with the additions of Conor Coady and Amadou Onana.
In their most significant transfer moves of the summer, the Toffees announced a season-long loan deal for Wolves defender Coady on Monday night before clinching a £33m move for highly-rated Belgium international midfielder Onana on Tuesday.
They will complete a trio of signings in the coming hours, having agreed a deal and personal terms with Paris Saint-Germain midfielder Idrissa Gueye. The 33-year-old is currently in negotiations with the Ligue 1 champions over severance pay but a deal with Everton has been agreed and he is expected to be confirmed in good time for Saturday’s clash with Steven Gerrard’s Aston Villa.
And now the club are looking to add a striker to their ranks, with interest in Chelsea’s Armando Broja understood to be “ongoing”. i understands there is still room in their budget for further additions and the club are keen to make quick progress on adding a forward to help shoulder the scoring burden that will fall on Salomon Rondon for the next month or so.
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The Belgium international has pace, technical ability and is renowned for driving runs. He can also play at either No 6 or as a centre half if required.
He will bring “energy” and declared it was an “easy” decision to move to Goodison Park. “I’m the sort of person that doesn’t go unnoticed,” he said.
There is particular satisfaction at Goodison Park at the way the club has been able to box clever in spite of financial fair play restrictions.
One of the conditions of the deal that took Richarlison to Tottenham was that Spurs paid the £50m fee up front, giving Everton room to re-invest in their squad.
They have supplemented this by working on loan deals and transfers that have been structured in the club’s favour.
The deal for Onana involves a small down payment and the rest of the £33m is structured to be paid over five years. Everton were able to gazump West Ham, who believed they had agreed a deal for the Lille man last week.
Similarly, the Coady deal was initially proposed as a permanent transfer but is instead a loan switch with an option to convert it into a permanent deal at the end of the season, which again affords the club room to manoeuvre in the transfer window.
Director of football Kevin Thelwell paid tribute to chairman Bill Kenwright’s contribution to the deal and i understands he has taken a more front-line role in negotiations, pushing hard to extract good value. While the Richarlison fee was widely regarded as a decent return on the Brazilian, he had been pushing for closer to a £90m valuation.
While a section of the fanbase have been vocal in their discontent, within Goodison Park there is a feeling their structured rebuild is continuing as planned. Following Duncan Ferguson and David Unsworth’s departures, there have been major changes in the academy.
There was further movement this week with highly-rated coach Kieran Driscoll leaving Wigan to assist Leighton Baines as an under-18 coach.
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