Everton have secured Portuguese striker Beto in a deal reportedly worth up to £26m, eight months after failing in a bid to sign him before the winter transfer deadline.
The 25-year-old put pen to paper on a four-year contract today to complete his transfer from Udinese and become the Toffees’ fifth signing of the summer. He will wear the Number 14 shirt last donned by Andros Townsend.
While the fee is officially ‘undisclosed’, sources in Italy are reporting that the deal is worth a fixed fee of €31m plus a further €8m in potential bonus payments, around £33.5m in total. The Athletic along with other reputable outlets in England claim, however, that the initial deal is in the region of £21.4m, well below the player’s recently-expired release clause, with a further £4.2m possibly to come in performance-related add-ons.
The same report by The Athletic also suggests that Everton won’t be due to pay any first instalment on Beto until the next financial year which represents smart business for the cash-strapped Blues who supporters hope will still be looking to strengthen the squad before the upcoming deadline, particularly if Demarai Gray’s proposed move to Saudi Arabia goes through.
“When a club like Everton tries to buy you in January and then comes again in the summer, you feel like, ‘Okay, they want me for real’, so that made the decision easy for me as well,” Beto said. “My idol, Samuel Eto’o, played here, too, which makes it even more special.
“I can bring courage, I can bring confidence and I think my biggest thing is effort. I will always bring enthusiasm to the team and to our games. I feel like my style is a really good fit with Everton.
“I am looking forward to getting started – today, right now. I know the team needs to score more goals and I will try to help with this. I love to score goals. I know we need this and I am here to help.
“I talked to Gerard Deulofeu the day before I travelled. He told me Everton is a big club, has crazy fans, they love you and it is a really good club to play for.”
Born in Lisbon with ancestral ties to Guinea-Bissau, Beto was something of a late bloomer, first asked to join Benfica’s academy before being let go as a teenager. He eventually signed with amateur side URD Tires in Portugal’s fifth tier and worked part-time in KFC to earn a living before moving to Olimpico Montijo where he netted 21 goals in 34 games, alerting Portimonense SC who snapped him up in 2019.
He has been with Udinese since joining them from Portimonense, initially on loan, in 2021 having scored 13 goals in 47 appearances for the Portuguese club. That move was made permanent the following year in a €7m deal Beto has since played 65 games for the Serie A outfit, scoring 22 times.
At 6′ 4″, the burly striker is seen as a viable replacement and competitor to Dominic Calvert-Lewin who has battled successive injuries over the past two years.
His arrival is expected to end Everton’s interest in Southampton’s Ché Adams but his St Mary’s team-mate, Kamaldeen Sulemana, continues to be linked with a move to Goodison Park.