Sean Dyche not yet told Everton likely to sell key asset amid financial woes at Goodison Park
Sean Dyche has not yet been directly told he is set to lose a key Everton asset in the transfer market but it “likely” has to happen, according to the Daily Mail.
The paper reported via their website on 5 April that despite selling more than £100million worth of players since the manager arrived at Goodison there is a high chance another big-money exit will need to happen to balance the books.
Jarrad Branthwaite and Amadou Onana have been widely linked with a number of interested clubs, and although Dyche previously claimed there were not issues at the club which would require the former to leave that situation appears wide of the mark heading into the summer market after the accounts released last weekend revealed a loss of £89.1m for the year 2022/23.
The apparently-probable loss of another key player comes as the former Burnley boss has insisted that the financial worries at the club, which look set to necessitate the exit, would never have been allowed to develop if he was in charge previously.
He said: “I am a custodian, I need to look after the club as best as I can,’ he added. ‘I will be judged on whether I win or lose but I know this club is in a healthier position than when I got here.
If someone wants to give me £200m I will have a go at spending it, but if it is £200m at the cost of the club I will go, ‘No, you can’t’.
“I have to take the heat along the way but I am not going to change my belief. The club needs to be in a healthier position than it has been, so someone has got to jump on the grenade.”
Jarrad Branthwaite or Amadou Onana to leave Everton?
Even if he hasn’t been told directly Dyche is surely aware of the direction of travel around him at the club, and while he would clearly hope to keep hold of his most important players and build around them it is now increasingly being suggested that the opposite is unavoidable.
After two consecutive profit and sustainability charges it will undoubtedly be galling for supporters to still see the club needing to part with another key man, despite already selling Richarlison, Anthony Gordon, Alex Iwobi and Demarai Gray out of necessity as much as choice in recent seasons, with Moise Kean also bringing significant money.
The manager seems to accept the situation for what it is so an Antonio Conte-style explosion at losing the likes of Branthwaite or Onana seems unlikely.
But when he is currently struggling to get a regular tune out of this squad even with the pair of sought-after stars available it begs the question as to how will he could cope without them.
With two of just three senior wingers on loan and the returns from a major sale necessarily impossible to reinvest entirely in the squad it could be another slog of a transfer window unless Kevin Thelwell can land creative deals that see payment structured favourably as with Beto and Youssef Chermiti.
A host of squad players’ contracts are set to expire which may ease the burden on the wage bill, but will require replacing, and with no academy conveyor belt of talent ready to fill the gaps by Dyche’s own admission [Liverpool Echo, 9 March] there presumably comes a limit where a bare bones playing staff becomes unsustainable.
In other Everton news, an update has emerged on the takeover after new talks between 777 Partners and the Premier League ahead of a 15 April deadline.
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