David Moyes Prioritizes Right-Back as Everton Seeks Solutions

David Moyes is adamant. Everton need a right-back before the transfer window closes.

The manager has spent the week insisting he has cover in the squad, naming Nathan Patterson, Merlin Rohl, James Garner and Jake O’Brien as players who could fill the role if required. But when the talking stopped and the football started, his team selection told its own story.

Rohl started at right-back in the 2-0 win over Crystal Palace and impressed, carrying his promising pre-season form into the Premier League opener. Moyes liked what he saw. He still wants a specialist.

“We definitely would like a right-back. We would,” he said, cutting through any suggestion that this is a luxury rather than a necessity.

The issue for Moyes is not simply filling a gap in the back four. It is what that compromise costs him elsewhere.

“For example today, while we're playing Merlin right back, I couldn't play him in midfield as well,” he explained. “So, today keeps me short of numbers in midfield, and I'm having to balance a little bit of what we want.”

That balancing act has become a theme of Everton’s recent seasons, with right-back a long-standing problem area. Moyes can shuffle the pack, but every solution comes with a trade-off.

He pointed to Jake O’Brien as another option who has already shown he can cope against pace out wide.

“Look, we can still play Jake O’Brien at right-back,” he said. “He's proved, certainly against a lot of the quick boys, that he's really good and he'll give us something if we need it in that position. But he prefers to be a centre back.”

Rohl, though, has forced his way into the conversation. The 21-year-old’s energy and athleticism have caught the eye, and Moyes clearly appreciates his attitude as much as his versatility.

“He is keen to do well and show us that he could be a right-back, Merlin. And because of that, we're happy,” Moyes said.

“He can play other roles for us, which means that we can play him further forward, we can play them in different ways. He's got a different sort of level of athleticism to some of the other boys in some ways. And he's a good footballer, generally, and he can score if we get him closer to the goal. But he's also doing okay.”

Rohl’s emergence does not change the manager’s stance. If anything, it sharpens the demand. If Everton do move in the market, Moyes expects any new arrival to raise the bar, not just plug a gap.

“Everybody's talking about a right-back, so I'm saying, well, I hope it's better than Jake O’Brien, I hope it's better than Merlin Rohl and what they're offering,” he said.

“And obviously, we're always trying to get better than what we've got – in every position to be truthful. You're always, as a manager, you're trying and it's not that easy to just go and get yourself better than those two. Merlin in pre-season played really well. He certainly deserves the chance to play.”

That is the tightrope for Everton now: reward the players who have stepped up, while still pushing for the specialist quality a long Premier League season demands. With the window ticking down, the club knows exactly what its manager wants. The question is whether the market will give it to him.