Player Watch Player Watch: Richarlison

The summer of 2021 signalled a new direction of travel for Everton.

Pushed up against financial fair play red lines, they spent a paltry £1.7 million on transfers, with winger Demarai Gray the only player to arrive for a fee.

At the same time, they were actively showing Premier League officials, with whom they’ve been in regular dialogue over compliance with financial regulations for over a year, that they were looking to reduce costs elsewhere.

Everton have lost £372 million over the last three years but the impact of COVID-19 and other relevant deductions mean they have been judged to dip under the Premier League’s limit of £105 million of losses over the same period. The exits of James Rodriguez and Bernard, two of the highest earners in the squad, were designed to trim the fat off a bloated wage bill that had spiralled out of control.

It was all a far cry from the early days of Supermarket Sweep-style shopping under then-new owner Farhad Moshiri when no expense was spared.

Famine followed that feast and the summer of 2022 has already adopted a similar pattern.

A proposed takeover is a new and complicating development but, while fellow Premier League sides including Manchester City, Leeds United, Liverpooland Southampton have already made moves in the first official fortnight of the window, Everton have largely kept their counsel.

But there is one very marked difference this time around: for the first time in Moshiri’s reign, Everton are likely to lose at least one key player before the September 1 transfer deadline. Whereas before they have chosen to cling onto main assets in the hope of making up ground on the league’s elite, now — largely out of necessity — they are open to offers for their leading lights.

From a regulatory and business point of view, June 30 remains a date of real significance for director of football Kevin Thelwell and co.

As the end of the current financial year, and thus the latest FFP cycle too, that date marks the final day in which incomings and outgoings can be added to Everton’s 2021-22 profit and loss calculations.

The bulk of Everton’s incomings for this window will have to be done after June 30. With so little wiggle room, the focus for the next few days will be on bringing in money and further reducing costs.

Sources have suggested to The Athletic that Everton have factored in the prospect of one significant sale for the current financial year. But business has been slow and while there has been interest in Richarlison, no club has yet followed up with an offer for the Brazil forward.

Equally, Fabian Delph, Cenk Tosun and other released players will also depart the club once their contracts expire at the end of this month. Until then, they are still technically Everton players, and receiving a wage.

There is a need to improve the squad that diced with relegation last season but Everton have little actual purchasing power until July, or after a big sale happens. Free agents, loans, and loans with obligations are the likeliest ways forward over the next week.

The unpalatable reality is that this is how Everton must operate, at least until they make those key sales.

Another uncomfortable complicating factor is that their situation is no secret.

Other clubs know they are compelled to sell and can use that as leverage in negotiations. Everton will have to balance that disadvantage in the market with the need to ensure their deals make as much sense for them and their financial fair play position as possible.

Of their two main assets, there is currently a wider market for Richarlison. While Dominic Calvert-Lewin does have his suitors elsewhere in the Premier League, his fellow forward has attracted interest from home and abroad.

The Brazilian is currently back home on holiday after attending Goodison team-mate Allan’s wedding in Rio de Janeiro earlier this month. He is assessing his options after comments while on end-of-season international duty seemed to hint at a move.
The Athletic understands the 25-year-old is in no rush to make a decision and at this stage is open to various different options. As galling as it may be for Everton supporters, that would not exclude remaining in the Premier League, where Tottenhamand Chelsea retain interest. Indeed, the former Watford man actively enjoys playing in England after five years here.

Richarlison would likely attract a bigger fee of the two strikers, but for Everton that is not the whole story.

The money they recoup must represent a profit in financial fair play terms. This means that selling Calvert-Lewin, for whom they paid £1.5 million in 2016, is more valuable than a transfer for his partner up front, who joined for around £40 million in 2018. It is not simply the highest fee that matters.

The sale of another striker may help. Moise Kean has not featured in Everton’s plans for some time and last summer he re-joined Italian club Juventuson a two-year loan including an obligation for them to buy him for £24 million after next season.

Everton may yet try to expedite that and secure the transfer a year early, bringing in further cash, but that would be subject to negotiations with Juventus and depend on their own plans for a forward who scored only six goals for them last season.

If Juventus prefer to stick to the current deal, their compulsory purchase option would be activated next summer and push the benefits to Everton’s books into a different financial fair play cycle.

The stifled landscape partly explains why free agents such as James Tarkowski appeal to the Goodison hierarchy, and also why the former Burnley centre-back’s signing has not yet been confirmed.

After the completion of a medical and a decisive breakthrough in talks, all that remains is for Tarkowski to be officially announced as an Everton player, but that is only likely to happen once his contract at Burnley officially expires on… June 30.
Everton sensed an opportunity with Tarkowski. They are picking up an experienced Premier League defender, and addressing what has been a problem position, without adding another fee to their books. Talks are ongoing for Tottenham midfielder Harry Winks, with the London club looking for a permanent transfer at around £20 million. For now, this is a significant stumbling block.
Everton remain a club on an increasingly taut high wire. The ire and attention of clubs such as now-Championship Burnley, who have complained repeatedly to the Premier League about what they perceive as their recent relegation rivals’ supposed rule-bending, has not gone away.
But for all of that, the Premier League signed off on Everton’s last set of accounts, and the club maintained upon publication that, once COVID-19 losses and other deductions were made, they had some headroom on the horizon.
Everton's FFP Position
*Financial years 2019-20 and 2020-21, including permitted COVID add-backs, will be rolled into one and averaged out
**Deductions include expenditure on women’s football, academy running and community schemes. Everton can also include some new stadium costs now planning permission has been granted
After June 30, Everton will heading into a new regulatory cycle. Clubs submitted forecasts for the financial year of 2022 to the Premier League in March and they will be assessed this summer by officials.
There will be no nasty surprises for the Premier League, who have been made aware of developments at Goodison, but they will also be keen to see Everton continue to toe the line and ease the pressure on them from other clubs who claim they are showing undue leniency.
Sales are a must, then, and equally vital to allow manager Frank Lampard to bolster a squad he is fully aware must be improved if next season is to be better than the previous one.
From next Friday, July 1, Lampard will ramp up his efforts to get the right players in, but he — and everyone else — knows that first, there must be outgoings.
Only then can Everton’s rebuild properly commence.
(Top photo: Tony McArdle/Everton FC via Getty Images)