A couple of weeks ago, this sounded well on the way to being done. John Stones, closing in on a free transfer back to Everton under the manager who gave him his Premier League start as a teenager.
David Moyes wanted him. Stones, by most accounts, wanted to come home. Talk had turned to contract length and salary, reportedly around £5.2m a year, rather than whether the move would happen at all.
Then Inter Milan entered the equation.
Why Inter’s interest changes the landscape
Tuttomercato’s report on Inter’s interest shouldn’t be dismissed. This is a club that has made a habit of getting more out of players in their thirties than almost anyone else in Europe — Francesco Acerbi and Stefan de Vrij have both been playing some of their best football at the San Siro well past 32, at less intensity than the Premier League demands week on week.
That’s the calculation Stones has to weigh up. He turns 32 this summer, and the last two seasons at City have been a fight against fitness as much as anything else. Serie A offers a slightly less intense route through a season for a defender trying to squeeze a few more good years out of his legs. England offers a return to where it all started.
Everton aren’t panicking. People close to the deal still call Stones their priority, and the player himself is said to lean toward Merseyside – an area he knows, the manager he trusts, no relocation required.
Coventry, Bournemouth and Newcastle have all been mentioned in passing, but nobody seriously expects them to be the ones who decide Stones’ fate.
Inter is a different proposition. The reporting out of Italy still has Everton ahead. But for the first time in this saga, ahead doesn’t feel like the same thing as a shoo-in.
