Moyes Looks to Free Agents as Everton Faces Depth Crisis

David Moyes has admitted Everton are now trawling the free-agent market after a bruising end to the transfer window left his squad short in key areas.

The club lost Iliman Ndiaye, Beto, Tim Iroegbunam, Adam Aznou and Nathan Patterson late in the window, stripping depth from a group already walking a tightrope with numbers. Both full-back positions are down to a single senior option. Centre-forward is in the same precarious state.

For a side Moyes insists should be “at the top end and challenge”, it is a risky place to be.

Free agents offer the only escape route. Players without a club can still sign outside the window, though they must be registered before a cut-off date understood to fall roughly a week after the deadline.

Speaking before Sunday’s meeting with Manchester United, Moyes did not bother to dress it up.

“We are looking at the free agents market,” he said. “I am trying to get a team that is going to be at the top end and challenge. I want the players to believe that we are moving forward – for me, that is really important.”

The honesty extended to his assessment of the window itself. Everton pushed hard, but the final hours unravelled.

Moyes called the finish “disappointing” and admitted frustration that more deals did not land. The collapse of a deadline-day move for Folarin Balogun summed it up, though he was keen to shut down any suggestion of blame or drama behind the scenes.

“Disappointed we didn’t do more business and disappointed things didn’t go our way in the end,” he said. “Sometimes in football you have to live with disappointment and we will move on.

“It wasn’t anybody’s fault [the failed Balogun deal]. It happens in football a lot. The player had a problem in his medical and that was simply it. There’s no other story behind it.”

So the picture is clear. Everton head into a clash with Manchester United light at full-back, light up front, and reliant on a short, sharp trawl of the out-of-contract market to plug the gaps.

If Moyes wants this squad to believe it is “moving forward”, the next week of recruitment without a transfer window may prove as important as the one that just closed.