David Moyes plays down Scott McTominay links

There’s been a lot of speculation in recent weeks about a possible return for Scott McTominay to England.

Everton have been consistently linked with the Serie A MVP and McTominay’s star-studded international break with Scotland has hardly helped to dampen those speculative stories.

With Everton set to face McTominay’s previous club, Manchester United, on Monday, manager David Moyes played down the links immediately in the pre-match press conference, questioning the price tag being thrown around.

"Well, I think the reality would be that, I'd never talk about other players, but if you're using the word £60m and those sort of numbers, I don't know we're quite at that level yet. Hopefully, we're working towards it,” said Moyes.

"We're trying to build ourselves back up. We've said many times about us trying to get on solid ground again. We've done that with the new owner's new stadium and staying up last year. So we have to try and make sure that we go steady.”

McTominay’s career has flourished since the Scottish midfielder left United to join Napoli in 2024. He helped Antonio Conte’s side win the Scudetto, picking up the Serie A MVP award en route, and finished 18th in the recent Ballon d'Or standings.

"I don't think we'll be shooting for the stars right away, but it might happen,” Moyes continued.

“But my gut feel would be to say, No, that wouldn't be where in the market we'd be in.

"We may do so (buy some big players) this window, but I think everybody mainly knows that January's never a great window. But hey, there's been some really good players bought in January and that helps clubs at different times."

Everton’s biggest purchase this summer, Tyler Dibling, however, has had a difficult start to life as a Toffee. The 19-year-old, signed for an initial £35m plus £5m in add-ons from Southampton, has struggled to displace Jack Grealish and Iliman Ndiaye from the starting XI and has made only four appearances in the league this season, featuring for a collective 62 minutes on the pitch.

"We're looking forward to getting Tyler more minutes as we go along and get him featuring in the games," said Moyes. "He's seeing Ili do really well on the right but we really like him as a player and he's certainly a player for our future."

 

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