Dwight McNeil, Dele Alli and Seamus Coleman ruled out – Confirmed Everton team news v Fulham
Sean Dyche has confirmed that Everton will be without Seamus Coleman, Dwight McNeil and Dele Alli for the Premier League match with Fulham on Saturday (12 August).
The Merseyside outfit host the West London club at Goodison Park in their first match of the new Premier League campaign.
But the home side will be missing three key players, with Dyche also providing injury updates on defender James Tarkowski and striker Dominic Calvert-Lewin.
“With Tarkowski, we were more being cautious over the last couple of games as you can imagine,” Dyche said, as per the official Everton YouTube channel. “The squad is still skinny, it’s more about managing the players. He’s fine.
“Unfortunately for Dom, the games just run out in pre-season for him. He’s fit and well as regards generally, we’re just finishing off the games programme. We’ll have to make a call for Saturday. Dele unfortunately has had a setback. He was just getting back in training, so that’s not ideal.
“For Dwight unfortunately it won’t be days, it will be weeks. It’s an ankle ligament injury. He’s not been injured very often, so we’re hopeful he deals with it pretty quickly. Seamus is just on his way, coming through the natural part of his rehab.”
Injury blows
Everton need all the help they can get this season, but this latest update from manager Dyche is a real blow, with the Toffees set to be up against it from the very start.
Fulham have had their own issues this summer after a top campaign last time out, and they will be very keen to kick things off with all three points.
Fortunately for Everton, the match is at Goodison Park, and the home supporters should be in full voice in order to give their players a much-needed boost, even after last season’s disappointment.
The absences of Coleman and Alli were perhaps expected and therefore understandable for fans, but the loss of McNeil is huge, particularly given how strongly he finished the last campaign.
It’s a massive day for the Toffees, with a loss on the opening day against Fulham set to strike fear into the club’s supporters for the entire season.
In other Everton news, Toffees coaching staff have been blown away by one fringe player at Finch Farm.