David Moyes has told Jamie Carragher what eased his doubts over agreeing to take over at Everton for the second time in his career
Leighton Baines and David Moyes during an Everton training session at Finch Farm on January 29, 2025
Leighton Baines and David Moyes during an Everton training session at Finch Farm on January 29, 2025(Image: Tony McArdle/Everton FC Official Photography Library/SmartFrame)
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Everton manager David Moyes has revealed that a visit to his house from two of the best players from his first spell in charge of the club convinced him to return to Goodison Park.
The Blues faced the very real prospect of marking the 133rd and final year at their historic home with a first-ever relegation from the Premier League when Moyes was approached by the club's new owners The Friedkin Group to replace Sean Dyche.
And the Scot, whose first stint at Everton lasted 11 years, has admitted he had doubts over whether the squad he would inherit had enough to stay up.
But a phone call from Seamus Coleman followed by a visit from the club's captain as well as Under-18s manager Leighton Baines helped reassure him.
Speaking in a fascinating interview with Jamie Carragher for the Telegraph, Moyes said: “When the opportunity came around again, I was thinking: ‘Bloody hell, Everton are on the verge of relegation here’.
“There had been a lot of good managers who had been here who had not been able to fix things.
“The one thing I knew I had in my favour was the knowledge of the club, of what the fans here demand and want. What I did not know for sure was whether we had what was required in the building.
“What happened next was that I got a call from Seamus Coleman, and he and Leighton Baines came to my house. They pushed me over the line to come back because they said with what we call in football ‘the small wins’ I could get to galvanise the team.
“That gave me the final nudge I needed.”
The belief of modern-day Everton legends Coleman and Baines - who were interim managers for the 2-0 FA Cup win at home to Peterborough United in the days after Dyche's departure and before Moyes' arrival - proved well founded.
After losing his first game back in the dugout, 1-0 at home to Aston Villa, Moyes oversaw a run of eight wins and seven draws in the final 18 games of the season to ensure Everton finished 13th and 23 points clear of the relegation places.
And he continued: “I immediately saw what Seamus and Bainsey said. The culture was not as bad as it might have been viewed externally.
“There were players here who fit the Everton DNA. Seamus was driving that. I could give you numerous examples of Seamus really getting into the boys on the training pitch, demanding they meet certain standards and digging them out if they didn’t.
“I saw the characters here to have a real go, not just at getting away from trouble last season, but to build on it this season. But if you ask me to name someone who has kept what we know as Everton going over the last few years, it’s Seamus.
“Lots of managers have come in, and lots of money was spent, but I always think there is something different about Everton. To me, this is a club that is better suited to being rebuilt gradually. We’re not Chelsea, Manchester City or Liverpool with lots of cash.
“Doing it step by step is the way for us. That might mean doing well one year, not so well the next, and then going forward again. It’s important not to always feel you’re back to square one after a setback.
“We were able to do that for a number of years (in Moyes’s first spell). For 11 years we were consistently challenging for the European places, or to be top four and five. What would the club have given for that level of consistency in the last few years?”
Saturday's 2-2 draw at Brentford means the Blues remain very much in the hunt for European football with six matches to play.
On Sunday they host neighbours Liverpool in the first ever Hill Dickinson Stadium Merseyside derby.
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