Everton forward transfer all but done

Juventus have moved quickly as they look to replace Cristiano Ronaldo who has returned to Manchester United by bringing back one of their own in Everton’s Moise Kean.

The 21-year-old came to Goodison Park in a £27 million move in August 2019, but has struggled for goals and regular game time since moving to Merseyside.

He was loaned out last season to Paris St Germain where he made an immediate impact surrounded by their phalanx of superstars, featuring in 41 games where he scored 17 goals with one assist, while winning the French Cup and the French Super Cup, finishing runners-up in Ligue 1 and losing in the semifinals of the Champions League.

The Italian has made 39 appearances for Everton - only ten of which were starts - and has found the net on just four occasions with two assists. He’s off to an inauspicious start to this season after finding the net brilliantly in the Carabao Cup win over Huddersfield Town only to see his goal chalked off to a dubious offside, and then compounded issues by reacting to a poor tackle that ended with him getting a straight red card.

Early today, transfer experts Fabrizio Romano, Gianluca Di Marzio and Romeo Agresti all reported the deal as a loan with an obligation to buy under certain unnamed conditions.

Juventus are struggling financially and have little or no cash to spend hence the transfer being structured as a loan to buy, much like they did with Federico Chiesa last summer and Manuel Locatelli a few weeks ago. For Everton, this is an opportunity to finally loosen the pursestrings on spending money that they have but cannot use without falling foul of the Premier League’s Profit & Sustainability rules.

The Blues continue to get linked with a move for Colombian winger Luis Dias from Porto, with a possible loan deal for James Rodriguez the other way, but there has not been any progress on that since last night.