It is the battle of the creative kings on Sunday by the banks of the Mersey as Jack Grealish meets Mohammed Kudus with both tied at the top of the Premier League assist charts.
And Everton boss David Moyes, who signed Kudus at West Ham before his £55million move to Tottenham, reckons the Ghana international has been the signing of the summer. One of his old signings Jarrod Bowen at West Ham has already scored at the Hill Dickinson Stadium this season.
Both Kudus and Grealish, who will return to the Everton XI all being well after missing last week’s loss at Manchester City due to being ineligible to play against his former club, are tied on four assists and have been a fantasy football manager’s dream.
Moyes knows both well after winning the Europa League with Kudus and said: ‘He’s a brilliant player. He has so many attributes to his game. He is a great boy to work with. I hugely enjoyed managing him. I had a good relationship with him.
‘He has great strength, great balance, can’t knock him off the ball. He can play inside or outside, he can play several positions if you want him. He is just finding his form at Tottenham. I see him doing lots of things whether that is scoring or creating goals.
‘At the moment, from a distance, he looks like their best buy of the summer. I am not a Tottenham expert but that’s how it looks.’
Spurs star Mohammed Kudus (left) has been the signing of the season, believes David Moyes
Grealish has formed a breathtaking attacking trio with Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall and Iliman Ndiaye this year but Everton’s chief problem has not been creating chances – as those three do – but putting them away, with both Beto and Thierno Barry guilty of big misses.
Moyes thinks signing a good striker is one of the hardest things to achieve, though, in the modern transfer market. He added: ‘It is difficult to buy strikers. Name the strikers who you can get, I can say that to you.
‘You think you will come up with someone. But I will tell you why I wouldn’t be able to get them, or why they wouldn’t want to come here.
‘Age or money or something, there would be a reason. Behind the scenes we are not stupid, we try to get what we think we can. Strikers, honestly, for years at West Ham I could not find one.
‘We got one every year, Gianluca (Scamacca) found it really tough and he was Italy’s No 9. But the three we have playing the way we are, we would have taken that. We cannot fix it all in one window. We probably were not attractive to do that either.
‘I hope we can find goals from Thierno and get some from Beto, the other boys are creative.’
Everton striker Beto has been guilty of missing chances for the Toffees this season
Everton will be without their best defender Jarrad Branthwaite for some time longer after the England international had hamstring surgery this week. The youngster was on the verge of a return last week but complications meant operating was necessary.
No timescale has been given yet but the expectation is that it will be months rather than weeks on the sidelines.
