Frank Lampard admits he doesn’t know the best position for Everton star Amadou Onana
Frank Lampard has admitted that he is yet to find Amadou Onana’s best positioning in an Everton shirt and finding the right midfield combination is high on his priority list, he told Liverpool Echo.
The Belgium international has been hit-and-miss since his £33million move from Lille in the summer [BBC Sport] and has been deployed in several midfield roles by Toffees manager Lampard.
Following a disappointing World Cup in which Belgium crashed out in the group stages, Onana will look to rebuild his confidence when Everton returns to Premier League action against Wolves on Boxing Day.
Speaking to Liverpool Echo, Lampard said on Onana’s positioning: “I think the question is about trying to get the best out of him when we are in possession.
‘And that’s probably a bit of a process for us and him, a case of how high we want him and sometimes how much we want him a little bit deeper.
“Because against Newcastle, we played him deeper, pretty much next to Gana [Gueye], and it affected our play through the lines, we couldn’t be as fluent, so, it’s trying to search for the right tweaks at the right time.
“There’s maybe some work to be done in trying to find that right combination [in midfield] and I think that’s pretty understandable.
“But this break is also a time of reflection to try and make sure we get the right balance.”
Box-to-box
Onana is a brilliant prospect for The Toffees and has shown glimpses of his talent in the early stages of the Premier League season.
Although a robust and hard-tackling midfielder, sitting at the base of Everton’s midfield seems a waste of his talents, with Idrissa Gueye also adept in that position and otherwise left unused.
The Belgian international is a strong carrier of the ball and can pop up in the final third and offer an attacking threat, so he must be deployed further up the pitch when the Premier League returns.
As a box-to-box midfielder, he would be given the freedom to express all his best traits while still allowing Gueye and Alex Iwobi to play in their favoured positions.
The main issue with this Toffees team is the lack of creativity in the middle of the park, so a January signing is extremely likely to be on the cards.