Øystein Hjelle Bondhus

The end of the season for Everton has been an anti climax and its also definitely fair to say (a) Iraola has done wonders for Bournemouth - quality manager who would improve alot of teams (b) Bournemouth have done brilliantly & overperformed (c) Everton have probably been at par this season vs their squad cost/wages (we should be 14th-15th) BUT we really screwed up the last 2 months when Europe was within reach, notably in defence. So manager & players need to reflect on the criticism (d) the £110m we spent in the summer was not enough to lift our squad cost to top 8; much more spending is needed. *But*. Some of the framing needs to come back to constraints in our finances - and that should NOT be taken as a defence of Moyes, because its factual, regardless of the manager. Because if Iraola or Glasner is to be manager, there is substantial investment still needed in this squad & our recruitment needs to significantly improve. Going into the 24/25 season Bournemouth had a squad cost £170m *higher* than Everton (!) and a wage bill on par. This is all from a revenue only slightly lower than Everton - the 25,000 higher gates Everton had compared to Bournemouth represents a £15m difference in turnover (£197m for us vs £182m for them). The bulk of turnover comes from broadcasting & sponsorship. Bournemouth also had no historic PSR issue nor burdened by large stadium related interest so they were able to spend more of their revenues then we were over several years before. *As a result, they have built an impressive squad*. Moving to 25/26, we were only able to spend £110m to improve the squad cost due to PSR. This took us from bottom 3 squad cost to 14th/15th squad overall. In 25/26, Bournmouth, (whose squad cost was £170m higher than ours to begin with) sold brilliantly: almost £300m raised from the sale of 5 key performers. They replaced them by spending £160m on 7 players, from where 4 have been outstanding. Clearly their recruitment was excellent: but it has been excellent for many years and they have been able to spend more freely than us (£400m squad cost in 24/25 vs £233m for us) So the key point is this. With ditching of PSR and the move to SCR, plus our higher revenues from the new stadium our spending power & flexibility has gone up. It would have been even higher had we made it to Europe, but even so, its a much better position than last summer. From this summer onwards, and with a new leadership team settling down - we can match Bournemouth in the transfer market & who we bring in, and how we do next season, and can be judged more fairly. If we don't improve significantly, there is no defending/mitigating it anymore. All this is not a defence of Moyes or saying we should lower our expectations. Its reality & affects whoever the manager is & whatever our expectations are.