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If you’re a football fan, Monday is the day you either wake up fresh wanting to rewatch the highlights of that victory – or hide away after that terrible defeat. This Monday us Evertonians had a different feeling,  thanks to the cancellation of our opener at White Hart Lane (brilliantly written about here) we felt even more ignored than usual and the 1-1 draw with Bohemians didn’t help either…

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Fellaini will now miss three matches: Arsenal – home (Sunday 14 November); Sunderland – away (Monday 22 November); West Brom – home (Saturday 27 November).

Was Fergie having a sniff around Mikel Arteta?

The young German is listed as a Man Utd player on their website

The link to see these profiles – http://www.manutd.com/default.sps?pagegid={FE60904B-C2A8-4E60-9B05-700DBBC29BBC}&section=playerProfile&teamid=&bioid=94383 - is interesting too. Changing the last two digits of the link from 71 upwards will reveal the “fantasy” players – but moving back down reveals normal Man Utd squad players. Did we just get a peek at The Lord of the Ferg’s potential summer shopping list?

If you have a gentleman’s agreement and then back out of it you are neither a gentleman nor worth having an agreement with in the first place. Good riddance.

Again, I’m sad to see him go, and a little angry too.

Last summer we were very close to nabbing Argentine midfielder Ever Banega off Valencia – there were murmurings of a possible loan-then-buy deal, but sadly it fell through. At the time. most people saw Banega as a bit of a joke, with Guardian journalist Sid Lowe saying the following:

“I personally think that Banega is a very talented footballer, he moves the ball very nicely. There have been one or two occasions when he’s looked like a genuinely good player, both at Atletico and Valencia…BUT the key word there is ‘one or two’…I think he’s not that good, I think he finds the Spanish game too quick and therefore would probably find the English game too quick as well. I think he is potentially a very very good player but I think he is also potentially a car crash.”

In yesterday’s Guardian Sid Lowe picked his La Liga team of the year, in that team – next to Messi, Xavi, and Cristiano Ronaldo was Ever Banega. Who knows what would have happened had Moyes managed to secure his signature, but this is et more proof that Everton’s manager is a transfer alchemist.

With FC No Knickers sniffing around for fresh blood it looks like they may raid Aston Villa or Everton again this summer, and both Milner and Arteta are thought to be targets. I’m a little worried about Man City coming after Arteta, to steal one of the best players in the league makes sense, but to take him off Everton would add the spice of vendetta to it, and we know Garry Cook doesn’t like us. Remember the schmaltzy mantra of delusional romantics “love conquers all”? In Premier League land it is “money conquers all”…. Here are three steps to drumming into Garry Cooke’s skull that “no means no”.

1. Announce to the press that because of Garry Cooke/FC No Knickers and the way they illegally took Joleon Lescott off us that we are permanently closing the lines of communication with them. We will not be bidding on any of their players for the forseeable future, and we not only discourage bids from Man City – we will throw them in the bin without even looking at them. Garryloadsamoneycooke@fcnoknickers.com will be tossed into our junk mail, and their number will be deleted from Bill Kenwrights phone book. In short, any communication from Man City will be forgotten before it is even read.

2. Faced with the fact that Everton have closed all legal modes of communication (a footballing restraining order) what do the scrotes at Middle Eastlands do? They want to steal Arteta off us, but their only way to speak with Arteta is illegally. (I also think that comments to the press about how much the manager likes a player, though not technically wrong, could be construed as illegal after we’ve made statement 1. above). They will obviously try to make contact (illegally) by contacting the player.

3. Bosh, job done. Man City have magically managed to speak to Arteta/Milner and in the process made an illegal approach. The Yanks call this entrapment. I’m all for it, and I think Villa should do the same.

 A bit of digging around journo’s Twitter accounts reveals that the “good news” is Jack Rodwell, who has signed a new contract with us. Daniel Taylor at the Guardian tweets: gd news 4 #Everton but let’s not kid ourselves – Jack Rodwell wouldn’t B signing new contract if genuine interest from #mufc 

Another player signed up, next up…Mikky Arteta…

"I will now sell 15 copies of Steven Pienaar"

Rob Gordon: I will now sell five copies  of “The Three EPs” by The Beta Band.
Dick: Go for it.
[Rob plays the record]
Beta Band Customer: Who is this? …

Rob Gordon from High Fidelity reminds me of David Moyes from Goodison Park. Our manager has lovingly assembled a cheap collection of classics. Arteta, Pienaar, Cahill – all bought for around £2million each.

Moyes proves again and again that you can find hidden unheralded gems if you nose around small shops, you dont have to shop at Harrods if you know where to look.

Steven Pienaar. He’s 28, he has one large contract left in him, and he’s a good player. We bought him for £2.3million, and he has a year left on his current contract. Every discussion on the merits of Steven Pienaar should screetch to a halt with that figure. £2.3million is a minuscule amount of money, and shows clearly just what an excellent judge of talent and potential David Moyes is.

Evertonians are already grumbling about another barren summer with little movement but the truth is that we don’t need anyone. This season’s deficiencies were caused almost entirely by our nasty run of injuries. We dont need any new signings, keeping our current squad as-is isn’t a step backwards, it just gives a team already overflowing with team spirit a chance to gel even more.

If Pienaar stays (either for one season or longer) we will have got incredible value for a couple of million quid. If we do end up losing Pienaar we will get good money, excellent money, probably at least 6 times our initial outlay.

Pienaar has been excellent for us, but he isn’t irreplaceable. In fact, we may already have a more than adequate replacement in Bily, who – despite having played the best part of two seasons back-to-back - has made a postive impression at Goodison.

We need to have faith in Moyes’ judgement. He is the ghostwriter behind these men, turning people like Arteta, Pienaar, Cahill, Baines, Jagielka – into some of the best in the league. Dusty flea markets and bargain basements are where Moyes is in his element, if Pienaar goes – expect him to unearth another shortly after.