Everton have enjoyed a strong start to the 2025/26 seasonplaceholder image
Everton have enjoyed a strong start to the 2025/26 season | Getty Images/ Canva
Why Everton have the potential to be this season’s suprise package
After a lacklustre 1-0 defeat to newly-promoted Leeds United at Elland Road, Everton have responded excellently with key victories over Brighton & Hove Albion and Wolves Wanderers.
They are also through to the next round of the Carabao Cup after beating Mansfield Town, meaning the Toffees now boast a solid record of three wins from their opening four matches. It’s a sign that Everton are beginning to reignite the spirit of the Blues under David Moyes, and it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that the Toffees could stage a shock push for European football as we saw last season with Nottingham Forest.
Everton retained the majority of their core from last season with star defender Jarrad Branthwaite penning a new deal and Iliman Ndiaye and Jordan Pickford both remaining on the books.
They’ve also opened up the brand new Hill Dickinson Stadium which is slowly beginning to feel more like home while they’ve also got new owners in the The Friedkin Group running things behind the scenes after things had begun to become stale and stagnant under Farhad Moshiri.
The Americans have flexed their financial muscle in this transfer window with a net spend of around £114m this summer, but unlike the days of Ronald Koeman and Marco Silva they look as if they are spending that money more wisely by making the team more well-rounded rather than simply trying to squeeze as many No.10s into the squad as possible as we perhaps saw most notably in 2017.
Why Everton were real winners in this transfer window
Everton have not only retained the services of their first team stars, they’ve also added quality throughout the pitch which instantly makes them a better and more entertaining team. While he’s yet to get off the mark in terms of goals, Thierno Barry, a £27m signing from Villarreal is one example of an exciting addition. The forward had a release clause of £34m which the Blues might have simply just activated in years gone by but they got the price tag down by £7m and still got their target through the door.
Barry has all the makings of a classic David Moyes striker. He’s 6ft 5, holds the ball up well and is excellent in the air. He scored 19 goals in 41 games across all competitions last season, including 11 in 35 matches during his first term in La Liga.
The France Under-21 international won the ninth most headers of any player in Spain last term and won 67.3% of aerial duels - the best of any striker in the league. He’ll compete with Beto for a starting place next season and is a more than adequate replacement for Dominic Calvert-Lewin after his injury issues.
The club have also added Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, the 2023/24 Championship Player of the Season for £25m. He struggled for minutes at Chelsea but showcased quality when called upon, particularly in the Conference league where he had seven goal contributions from 13 appearances in that competition. Dewsbury-Hall provides a sense of creative spark that was lacking in the middle and seems to have slotted excellently into the Toffees midfield.
The Blues have also added midfielder Carlos Alcaraz after a solid loan spell last season, backup goalkeeper Mark Travers and defender Adam Aznou, but the biggest coup of the summer looks to be the loan signing of Jack Grealish.
Grealish, who once cost Manchester City a club-record £100m in 2021, has started his Everton career in brilliant fashion and is starting to look once again like the creative maverick that he was at Aston Villa. Grealish lost his spark at the Etihad and became a squad player in a very systematic City team but now looks to have been given the license to play with that bit more freedom and take people on in deeper areas.
The former Aston Villa midfielder currently leads the way for goal creating actions in the Premier League despite playing one less game than many of his counterparts while he also ranks joint fifth in the division for successful take-ons. It’s only a small sample after three matches but it’s already a sign that Grealish can add creativity to an Everton team that had previously been hugely reliant on just Iliman Ndiaye to open up defences.
Why Everton’s clash with Aston Villa is a golden chance to lay down a marker
Everton have ambitions of climbing the league table after a productive end to last season. In David Moyes, they have a manager that’s already led the Toffees into Europe on four occasions during his first stint, while the Scotsman proved he can get a team quickly progressing from the lower end of the table to Europe with West Ham by leading them to football on the continent on three occasions as well while also winning the Conference League.
He’ll hope to achieve that feat again with the Toffees but first knows his side must prove themselves against established European sides. Unai Emery’s Aston Villa are one of them after three successive finishes in Europe, but they are not currently playing like one after picking up just one point from their opening three matches.
The season is still extremely young but a victory for Everton over Aston Villa could well lay a marker for the rest of the campaign as it’d leave them eight points clear of the Villans and would take them right into the upper echelons of the league table.
Continue Reading