Wrong and wrong
If he was a good player he wouldn’t have lasted 5yrs at Burnley and two relegations
And nobody is free, apparently the signing on fee is usually a years wage. So potentially 3/3.5 mil
Some longer-term planning going on.
Difficult to be patient as an Evertonian at this point - but the football side needs building now the stadium is built.
Think Marseille fell into the same trap as us. He’s quite good and going for cheap. Then when you get him you go, actually he’s awful and that was a lot.
Boss innit? Didn't make it at his boyhood club, so he's made the best of it and got to live in some sound places and play at a high level. Respect to the lad.
What players sometimes do, is they make a deal with their existing club, so lets say hes on £175k a week (£9.1m a year) Man City may pay him £5m to leave, over half his wages, and then he is free to negotiate a new deal with Everton.
Man Utd did...
Barry was 29 when that happened but that was because Barry had never had any pace, he was just exposed in that moment rather than him being on a huge downward trajectory. He played over 100 games for City after that, winning the PL and FA Cup...
I remember Barry getting ripped a new one for England (Germany ?) as he got older - then we still managed to get a good year or two out of him after that.
I get the reservations - but also England can be a bit of a circus.
I think Walker is a very good player - appreciate he is well below his peak.
Maybe this gives us the option to go for a riskier young right-back as understudy ?