Everton boss David Moyes says there is a dearth of No 9s in top-level football – and recruiting the right one is the hardest job in the game.
The new Toffees manager has his own nine problems with Dominic Calvert-Lewin scoring two goals in 20 games this season – currently on a 16-match drought – and his back-up Armando Broja is injured and expected to be out for at least two months.
Everton spent £40million combined on strikers Beto and Youssef Chermiti in summer 2023 but they have scored four and zero league goals respectively, though the latter has been injured and dubbed as one for the future.
And Moyes reckons the role of a traditional striker has changed.
‘It’s a position everyone is looking for,’ he said ahead of Everton hosting Tottenham on Sunday, when they will welcome back one of their former prolific forwards in Richarlison. ‘Quite often you’re having to take a chance on someone.
‘A real risk early on to get them in and hope they might develop into the real deal. To go and buy them, with all due respects to the rejuvenation of Chris Wood for example - there wouldn’t have been many people who saw that coming.
‘At one point it looked like he wasn’t getting a game for Nottingham Forest. He’s got a chance, the team has shown up and it has got much better. I think there is a big shortage of No 9s. Even in the coaching world, all the players want to be No 10s because they get more of the ball.
‘There’s less and less Alan Shearer type figures if you want to mention that name.’
Moyes has admitted he wants to sign new players this month but finding someone who can help Calvert-Lewin and add goals is trickier in reality than on paper. Asked if it is easy to sign a goal-scorer, he added: ‘No, I don’t think it is.
‘If you are a club that makes loads of chances, I mean this with Manchester City, you might not need their centre forward too much in some actions. They just need him to finish. They have the best in the world (in Erling Haaland) who is the goalscorer supreme.
‘Teams like us probably need centre forwards who can do a bit of everything – work, press, chase and maybe they will have to play on their own a bit. We are not the only team in that category but trying to find and pick one out is not easy.
‘What I would say is that I think Dom got three chances on Wednesday night, that might be three more than he's had recently. So it was a good sign that he got them. Now, we wanted him to maybe take one of them. We just need to finish them off.’
Reflecting on his first week in the job, Moyes said: ‘I think they are a fully committed group of lads. I think that they've got an awful lot of good, good traits to them, which is a good sign as well.
‘I think what we need to do is to have some extra quality in areas, and that means having to find some extra quality out of them. That could just be confidence, we need to get that confidence back into them - that will play a good part in it.
‘But what I am also alluding to is that we could probably do with getting a couple of players with different qualities to help them.’