The title of the thread refers to "worst/stupidest signings" and I'm going to interpret that as signings which were doomed from the start, either because we grossly overpaid for them, or were clearly not what we needed at the time.
Sigurdsson and Klaassen must be in any such list - they cost about £70M combined and both played in the same position, in which we ALREADY had Rooney and Barkley. Kone and Niasse both cost what were at the time quite substantial fees, contributed very little, and eventually left on free transfers. Bolassie's fee was mad - £28M for a one or two goal a season man was clearly a disaster waiting to happen. It was a crazy decision to sell Don Hutchison and replace him with an inferior player in Alex Nyarko for a (then) massive fee and big wages.
I would be reluctant to include loan players, though El-Ghazi would be an exception here, seeing as ten thousand Evertonians spent more time on the Goodison Park pitch* than he did.
Free transfers are also a problem area - should we include duds like Alcaraz and Cuco Martina, even though they cost comparatively little?? What about Fabian Delph, who everyone knew was hideously injury prone before we signed him? Rondon, who was a flop in the Chinese league?
Then there's horrors like Schneiderlin, Sandro Ramirez, Niclas Alexandersson, Pistone, Maupay, Rod Belfitt, Joe Harper, Dave Lawson, Claus Thomsen, John Spencer, Degn, and Tarashaj
But the pride of place must go to Gbamin.
* = after the Crystal Palace game
Sigurdsson and Klaassen must be in any such list - they cost about £70M combined and both played in the same position, in which we ALREADY had Rooney and Barkley. Kone and Niasse both cost what were at the time quite substantial fees, contributed very little, and eventually left on free transfers. Bolassie's fee was mad - £28M for a one or two goal a season man was clearly a disaster waiting to happen. It was a crazy decision to sell Don Hutchison and replace him with an inferior player in Alex Nyarko for a (then) massive fee and big wages.
I would be reluctant to include loan players, though El-Ghazi would be an exception here, seeing as ten thousand Evertonians spent more time on the Goodison Park pitch* than he did.
Free transfers are also a problem area - should we include duds like Alcaraz and Cuco Martina, even though they cost comparatively little?? What about Fabian Delph, who everyone knew was hideously injury prone before we signed him? Rondon, who was a flop in the Chinese league?
Then there's horrors like Schneiderlin, Sandro Ramirez, Niclas Alexandersson, Pistone, Maupay, Rod Belfitt, Joe Harper, Dave Lawson, Claus Thomsen, John Spencer, Degn, and Tarashaj
But the pride of place must go to Gbamin.
* = after the Crystal Palace game
