- Duncan Ferguson has said he warned Everton against signing Cenk Tosun
- Tosun arrived from Besiktas in January 2018 during the Farhad Moshiri era
- The deal became a symbol of Everton’s confused recruitment approach
Cenk Tosun should not be remembered as Everton’s worst signing.
There were too many contenders during the Farhad Moshiri years for that title to be handed out lightly.
But his move from Besiktas in January 2018 still feels important because of what it came to represent. Everton were spending big, searching for quick fixes and hoping individual signings could solve problems that ran far deeper than one position.
Duncan Ferguson’s recent comments bring that period sharply back into focus.
The Everton legend has said he warned the club against signing Tosun, believing the Turkey international was not the right player for what Everton needed. Looking back now, it is hard not to see that as a telling moment.
Not because Ferguson was proved right about one striker.
Because Everton failed to listen.
A signing from a confused era
At the time, Tosun’s arrival made some sense on paper.
Everton needed a striker following Romelu Lukaku’s departure, goals had dried up and the club were stumbling through a season that had already seen Ronald Koeman replaced by Sam Allardyce.
The Turkey international arrived from Besiktas in a deal worth around £27 million and carried a strong reputation after impressing in both domestic and European competition.
Initially, there were encouraging signs.
Tosun scored important goals during the second half of the 2017/18 campaign and looked capable of becoming the focal point Everton had been searching for.
Yet the momentum never lasted.
As managers changed and Everton continued searching for a consistent identity, the striker gradually slipped down the pecking order before eventually departing the club.
For many supporters, the move has since become synonymous with the wider problems that defined the Farhad Moshiri era.
More than just a transfer flop
What makes the story resonate today is not simply that Tosun failed to justify his fee.
Everton supporters have seen plenty of expensive signings struggle at Goodison Park and beyond.
Instead, the transfer came to represent a wider issue that plagued much of the Moshiri ownership period: uncertainty over who was driving recruitment decisions.
Too often, Everton appeared caught between different visions, different voices and different priorities.
The result was a squad assembled at enormous cost but lacking balance and long-term planning.
Tosun was not responsible for that.
He simply became one of its most visible examples.
Ferguson’s warning now feels symbolic
That is why Ferguson’s warning carries weight.
Few figures are more closely connected to Everton’s modern history than the former striker.
He knew what a centre-forward at Everton needed to be. He understood the demands of Goodison Park, the physicality of the Premier League and the connection supporters expect from players leading the line.
Tosun was not lazy, and he was not without ability. His spell should not be rewritten as a lack of effort.
But he never truly looked like the answer.
Years later, his transfer feels like a snapshot of Everton at their most uncertain: expensive, reactive and too easily swayed by the promise of a quick fix.
Ferguson’s warning did not change the decision.
But it now reads like something Everton should have paid far more attention to.
