Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall Reflects on Everton's Chaotic Deadline Day
Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall didn’t just live through Everton’s chaotic deadline day. He rode every bump of it with the same whiplash as the supporters – excitement, confusion, then a cold, sharp frustration.
The difference is what came next.
From the outside, Everton’s window looked like a mess. David Moyes finished the day with fewer players than he started with, just one recognised striker and no natural cover at either full-back. A £40m move for US international Folarin Balogun collapsed at the last moment, the forward walking away minutes after a deal sheet had gone in. The fanbase stared at the squad list and asked, under The Friedkin Group, where on earth this club is heading.
Inside Finch Farm, Dewsbury-Hall insists, the mood is very different.
“The mood is really good to be honest,” he says. “Definitely not the same as what I’ve seen on the outside. There’s a good mentality this year of: ‘We’ll show everyone.’”
Everton’s performances so far back him up. This is not a dressing room braced for a survival scrap, whatever the noise beyond the gates suggests.
‘All the meltdowns… it annoyed me’
Dewsbury-Hall is not one for platitudes. He has seen the social media storms, the fury at the lack of signings, the gloomy predictions of another season spent looking over shoulders.
“I’ve seen all of the reactions, all of the meltdowns, and in all honesty it annoyed me a bit,” he says, words as direct as his passing. “I get where people are coming from; everyone wants to sign everyone and have the perfect squad. But there are still 19 lads in this building who are going to hopefully take this club to good things this year. That was getting disregarded.
“I saw people saying: ‘We’ll be lucky to stay up this year.’ What message is that sending to the lads who are already here? I’m not blaming anyone. We get it. It didn’t work. But let’s all be positive – right, it’s done, bang, let’s go – and that’s what we’ve been trying to say in the dressing room.
“Of course we would have wanted to sign a couple more, but we’re happy with what we’ve got and it’s given us more impetus now to move on.”
Moyes has already voiced his own concern about what the club’s business, or lack of it, might say to his players at a time when he wants to push standards higher. The obvious question, then: has this window actually damaged belief inside the camp?
“Not really, no,” Dewsbury-Hall replies. “I know we’ve got a smaller squad but we’ve got some really good players. Our starting XI is top, a European starting XI.
“I get it, you need a whole squad, but we’ve got 17, 18 players at a really, really good level. I don’t think a couple of years ago it was at that level. Actually I know it wasn’t.
“Things can be out of your hands in football and that’s what happened for us. But we quickly realised: ‘Hang on a minute, look around the dressing room – top player, top player, top player.’ If we’re doing the right things we can still be successful.”
From Stamford Bridge to the core of Everton
Dewsbury-Hall’s conviction carries weight because of the role he now plays. Since his £28m move from Chelsea last summer, he has grown into one of Moyes’s most influential players. The decision to walk away from Stamford Bridge, from a club stacked with midfielders, has been justified by minutes on the pitch and authority off it.
“I’m in the prime years of my career,” the 28-year-old says. “I couldn’t afford to spend more years stagnating.”
He hasn’t. His impact is no longer confined to matchdays. With Séamus Coleman gone after his long, defining spell as captain, Everton needed new voices. A leadership group emerged. Dewsbury-Hall is in it.
“Because Séamus has left such a big hole we need a group of experienced lads to crack on together and keep the standards high and to drive things,” he explains. “It’s just the more experienced lads – [Jordan] Pickford, Tarky [James Tarkowski, the new club captain], Jimmy [James] Garner, myself. The ones that have been playing in the Premier League for years or feel like they are settled at the club.
“It’s nice [to be voted in after just one season] but it’s definitely an impact I wanted to have. I’m really pleased that the lads look at me as someone that can be important for the dressing room.”
That influence stretches to the next generation.
Protecting the kids – and pushing them
Few stories captured the raw emotion around Everton this summer quite like Harrison Armstrong’s. The 19-year-old midfielder came close to leaving for Nottingham Forest before deadline day. The backlash from Evertonians at Bournemouth – anger, songs, a clear message to the hierarchy – forced a dramatic rethink from the owners.
“They definitely made their feelings known and obviously it worked,” Dewsbury-Hall says. “Big credit to them for that, they were amazing that day. And I know for a fact it made Harrison feel very good and it helped him. He is a very confident lad and well respected in the dressing room for such a young age.”
Dewsbury-Hall has taken on a mentor’s role, though not without a sharp edge.
“If there is anything I can help him with then I will. Shooting’s definitely one because his shooting is sometimes not the best, and I’ve told him that many times. But he’s got pretty much everything else.
“He always likes to say he’s got a better strike than me so I just tell him to look at the [Crystal] Palace goal or the Wolves goal last season. We have good banter.”
Those goals – technically clean, struck with conviction – are part of why Dewsbury-Hall talks so confidently about his own ceiling.
Europe, cups and England
There is no attempt to play down expectations. He sets them himself. High.
European qualification. A serious cup run. A more complete version of his own game. And, hanging over all of it, an England debut.
He knows Gareth Southgate’s successor, Thomas Tuchel, has been watching.
“I know I’m the closest I have ever been now,” he says. “You get a message two weeks before the squad is announced. I got one for the long list for the World Cup and I’ve had one for these next games. It’s nice. It means you are doing OK.
“It’s a long, long message. It tells you that it’s a legal requirement for us [the Football Association] to tell you in advance that you are in contention and to be available for these dates. It’s a good feeling because you think: ‘OK, I am close,’ but you know you have to keep pushing it to the last minute.
“It’s up to me. It’s got to be me that forces his hand to choose me. It’s not going to be given to me.”
That last line could double as Everton’s motto for the season. Nothing will be handed to them: not signings, not safety, certainly not Europe. The squad is thin, the margin for error thinner.
Dewsbury-Hall looks around the dressing room and sees enough. Enough quality, enough hunger, enough anger at the outside noise to turn frustration into fuel.
Now the question is simple: can this smaller, tighter Everton squad turn that siege mentality into something that actually shifts the club’s direction on the pitch?
