Some 20 years ago today, David Moyes snapped up Joseph Yobo as his first signing as Everton manager and the Nigerian represented the kind of purchase that the Blues might be prudent to try and go for this summer. Back in the summer of 2002, funds were tight at Goodison Park but whereas his compatriot and predecessor Walter Smith had often gone for big name veterans such as John Collins (30); Richard Gough (37); Paul Gascoigne (33); Mark Hughes (36) and David Ginola (35), as a bright young manager himself at the time, Moyes, who had had only been appointed in March, embarked upon reshaping his squad with more youthful, energetic and hungry players.
Similar to Frank Lampard and Kevin Thelwell now, Moyes was operating within parameters in which he had to be creative with his budget and his acquisition of Yobo proved to be particularly canny. The acquisition represented something of a coup for Everton who had finished the previous season in 15th place with 43 points while also having just one top half placing in the Premier League across its first decade as they beat off reported interest from both Juventus and Arsenal – the reigning champions in Italy and England respectively – plus Newcastle United who had just come fourth.
Moyes said: “As far as I’m concerned, he’s Nigeria’s best player and I’m sure he’ll go on to captain his country. He played in several different positions for his country in the World Cup which gives us a great opportunity to use him just where we see fit.”
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Over his 11-year tenure at the Blues, the Scot would become well-known for his attention to detail – he’d later reveal he’d watched another centre-back Joleon Lescott play on no fewer than 24 separate occasions before deciding to sign him – and the way he forensically mapped out the Yobo deal represented the ushering in of a different kind of transfer approach. Not only did Everton have to be extremely wary over how much they spent – although their biggest purchase of the window, £3.5million goalkeeper Richard Wright proved an expensive flop in contrast to Nigel Martyn the following year who Moyes regarded as his best-ever signing – as gifted as Yobo was, he was at the time still an unproven quantity in terms of English football.
Therefore, securing the player on a season-long loan from Olympique Marseille for a relatively modest £1million fee with option to buy later if he settled on and off the pitch looked like an inspired piece of business at the time and subsequently proved to be the case. Before the turn of the calendar year, Everton had seen enough promise from Yobo to try and turn his temporary transfer into a permanent switch and while it took them several more months to negotiate the deal, he penned a four-year contract the following May with the Blues paying a £4million fee.
The try before you buy method served Moyes well as it also enabled him to acquire the likes of Mikel Arteta and Steven Pienaar – at just £2million a piece, a real couple of bargain buys – while others such as Jo, Manuel Fernandes and Philippe Senderos, were sent back if they did not fit the bill. Up until Yobo’s arrival, Everton had only enjoyed very limited success with African players so that was another reason to exercise caution.
Nigerian striker Daniel Amokachi arrived for a then club record £3million in 1994 but although he was a hugely-popular figure with the Goodison faithful and remains a cult hero for his two-goal cameo appearance off the bench in the 4-1 victory over Tottenham Hotspur in the 1995 FA Cup semi-final – a display manager Joe Royle quipped was: “The best substitution I never made” – his scoring record in English football was underwhelming and he was sold to Besiktas for little more than half the fee the Blues paid for him in 1996 despite having just won a gold medal at the Olympic Games in Atlanta. Ivory Coast international Ibrahima Bakayoko had an even more fleeting stay and after joining from Montpellier for £4.5million in 1998, returned to the French League with Marseille just a year later.
Ghanaian midfielder Alex Nyarko, who also arrived for £4.5million from Ligue 1, signing from Lens in 2000, fared worst of all as he suffered the ignominy of having an irate fan take to the turf and offer to swap shirts with him during a lacklustre display in a 4-1 defeat to Arsenal at Highbury, an incident that left the distraught player demanding to be substituted. Mozambique-born Portugal international Abel Xavier proved more competent but then he went and became the last player to date to move directly between Everton and Liverpool when he crossed Stanley Park in January 2002, a mere six weeks before Moyes’ appointment.
There were no such issues for Yobo though. Possibly the Blues’ quickest centre-back since Kevin Ratcliffe, the club’s most-successful captain, who had departed Goodison Park over a decade earlier, he became a towering presence in Moyes’ defence for the next eight years. A regular in the 2004/05 team that achieved Everton’s highest-ever Premier League finish of fourth while also playing in the 2009 FA Cup final, he became the first African to captain Everton while his team-mates Tim Howard (414) and Tim Cahill (278) are the only other players from outside the British Isles to top his 259 appearances for the club.
Capped 101 times for Nigeria, joint second on the Super Eagles’ all-time list and now assistant coach of his national team, Yobo reflected on his time at Goodison Park last year. Looking back, his sentiments echoed words uttered by legendary manager Howard Kendall over 30 years earlier, as he said: “After a couple of games, I couldn’t believe how much I liked it. I loved Everton so much, it was like a marriage… “Everton showed me to the world, they made me Joseph Yobo.”
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