Richarlison’s mumps diagnosis a blessing disguise for Everton

There’s a number of Everton’s players still traipsing about on football pitches worldwide and that’s bound to cause Marco Silva some concern as they aren’t getting any rest.

Richarlison and Yerry Mina are in Brazil for the Copa America while Idrissa Gueye and Henry Onyekuru are at the African Cup of Nations in Egypt. Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Kieran Dowell were in action with the England Under-21s in the European Championship, Jordan Pickford and Michael Keane featured for the England senior side in the Nations League semifinals and third place game. Gylfi Sigurdsson, Lucas Digne (and Kurt Zouma) along with Seamus Coleman were involved with their respective national sides for Euro 2020 qualifiers too.

Tom Davies and Cenk Tosun have picked up injuries and are still rehabbing from those, and will not be available for the beginning of the preseason schedule.

The Blues are expected to start trickling back to Finch Farm starting this coming Monday, with the players that have not been involved with their national teams coming back first. Everton fly out to Kenya later in the week for Sunday’s Sportpesa Trophy clash in Nairobi against Kariobangi Sharks, and will very likely field an experimental side littered with youth, including star striker Ellis Simms.

Striker Richarlison has been diagnosed with mumps and is out of the game today against Paraguay

So the news that broke yesterday in Brazil that Richarlison has contracted the mumps will be welcomed as it’s a completely harmless illness that will require seclusion for the first three-five days followed by a few weeks of rest, something the forward would not have gotten had he continued to play a part in the seleção’s campaign to lift the Copa America at home.

A big part of why Richarlison had flamed out in the second half of his first season in England with Watford FC was because he’d been playing non-stop football in Brazil before joining the Hornets, making a full calendar year of football from May ‘17 to May ‘18 when he racked up 4,619 minutes of game time (the equivalent of 51.3 full 90-minute matches).

With that knowledge, this mumps diagnosis is really a blessing in disguise as it will force the player to get some rest ahead of what could be a very exciting 2019-2020 season for the Blues.