Everton turns to free agents as Moyes addresses squad issues

David Moyes cut a realistic figure on Friday. No fury, no theatrics. Just the blunt admission that Everton’s squad is short and the solutions now lie in football’s last-chance saloon: the free agent market.

Days after a chaotic end to the transfer window that stripped depth from several areas of the pitch, the Everton manager confirmed the club are already scouring the list of unattached players in a bid to plug the gaps.

“We are looking at the free agents market,” Moyes said ahead of Sunday’s meeting with Manchester United. “I am trying to get a team that is going to be at the top end and challenge. I want the players to believe that we are moving forward – for me, that is really important.”

Right now, belief has to do battle with basic arithmetic.

Holes everywhere, time ticking

Everton’s late-window exits have bitten hard. Iliman Ndiaye, Beto, Tim Iroegbunam, Adam Aznou and Nathan Patterson all departed in the closing stages of the market, leaving Moyes with a squad that looks dangerously thin in key positions.

Both full-back roles are exposed. Centre-forward is, too. In each of those areas, Everton now effectively rely on a single senior option. One injury, one suspension, and the balance of the side tilts.

Because the main window has shut, Everton can no longer buy or loan from clubs under normal rules. But they can still move for players without a club. Those signings, though, must be registered by a secondary deadline understood to fall roughly a week after the window closed, giving the club only a narrow window to act decisively.

The margin for error is small. The margin for hesitation is even smaller.

Balogun collapse and a bruised window

Moyes did not hide his disappointment at how the window ended, even if he refused to turn it into a blame game.

“Disappointed we didn’t do more business and disappointed things didn’t go our way in the end,” he admitted. “Sometimes in football you have to live with disappointment and we will move on.”

The most painful blow came on deadline day, when a move for Folarin Balogun collapsed at the final stage. For a squad crying out for another centre-forward, it felt like the deal that had to happen. It didn’t.

Moyes, though, was adamant there was no drama behind the scenes, no hidden twist.

“It wasn’t anybody’s fault,” he said of the failed Balogun move. “It happens in football a lot. The player had a problem in his medical and that was simply it. There’s no other story behind it.”

No conspiracy. Just a medical issue, a failed move, and a manager left to pick through what’s left of his options.

United on the horizon, questions in the background

All of this unfolds with Manchester United looming on Sunday. Moyes wants a side that can “be at the top end and challenge,” but he goes into a marquee fixture knowing his squad is light in exactly the areas where modern Premier League games are often decided: out wide, in the channels, and through the middle.

The free agent market rarely offers long-term answers. It offers stopgaps, gambles, experience on short-term deals. But right now, that might be exactly what Everton need just to steady the ship.

Moyes has made his stance clear: the club will move, and quickly, if the right players are there. The next few days will show whether Everton can turn a disappointing window into something more manageable — or whether this season will be defined by the business they couldn’t get over the line.