Championship players should be on Everton January radar
The January transfer window looms and could prove fundamental to help turn around the current problems at Everton and rescue something from this season.
We know that Everton manager Rafa Benitez and Director of Football Marcel Brands are planning who they will be pursuing when the new year window opens.
The focus is on midfield and attack with a view to possibly bringing in two or maybe three new players if the deals can be done.
One place that the Toffees’ should be looking is the Championship. The club have little money to spend and that could tie their hands in terms of who they can bring in.
And, while there is a gulf in quality, the Championship does offer some potential gems and there are certainly players in that division who can step up.
In particular, there are several talented forwards in that league worth considering if the Blues’ want a more affordable option up front.
The obvious ideal target would probably be Fulham’s Aleksandr Mitrovic. The Serbian centre-forward has had a sensational season so far netting 21 times already as he leads the West London club’s charge back towards the Premier League.
He’s obviously got top flight experience and is a player who I think Everton should have considered before. But this time round with his stock high I doubt the Toffees’ could afford the fee, even if Fulham were prepared to sell.
One interesting player playing his trade in the second tier is Sam Gallagher at Blackburn Rovers. The 26-year-old Scot is a big, powerful forward who can play up front or wide and seems especially strong in the air.
Given that Benitez is keen on a back up to Dominic Calvert-Lewin who can offer a real threat in the air and one who can hold the ball up well, Gallagher might be worth a look. Particularly, because deadline day signing Salomon Rondon has so far anyway, been a busted flush.
However, the one Championship forward who I think might represent a decent bet for Everton is another Blackburn forward Ben Brereton.
He is a quick, skillful, very versatile and productive forward who can play anywhere across the forward line including as a central striker. That would give Benitez another alternative who can operate in different positions in attack and give him more tactical options.
Brereton is it seems especially effective playing on the left and he can both create and score goals and has fourteen in the Championship so far. He’s also a Chilean international, a little unusually for a Championship footballer, and so has proved he can play at a higher level.
Turning to midfield and with the need to find a powerful, athletic addition who can contribute goals, one possible option could be Philip Billing.
The Bournemouth player is a big, strong, versatile midfielder who has plenty of Premier League experience and would offer both defensive and attacking contributions.
Billing could be worth bringing back to the top tier as he would offer the athletic, goal-scoring midfielder that the team have missed since Abdoulaye Doucoure’s injury, although of course he’s not of Doucoure’s quality.
He has been a key player to the Cherries’ season so far, but they might be pursuaded to sell, again though it would be tough to get it done in January.
As always with these players you are never certain they can take the step up (apart from Billing of course) and whether Benitez and Brands will look at such individuals is far from certain.
But, young, hungry Championship players desperate to show they can cut it in what is arguably the best league in the world might well possess the sort of character that some of the overpaid and pampered Premier League footballers the Toffees’ have signed recently, seem to lack.
And, the Blues’ have a good past tradition of finding and molding players from the second tier that other clubs weren’t sure about. Players such as Peter Reid back in the eighties and Tim Cahill in the David Moyes era. Perhaps it’s worth going back to that transfer policy again.