OPINION
Everton fans were crying out for a new centre-forward in the summer following the sale of Romelu Lukaku to Manchester United and their prayers certainly were not answered.
The Toffees opted to recruit attacking midfielders Davy Klaassen, Wayne Rooney and Gylfi Sigurdsson to try share the goal load, but they did take a punt on youngster Sandro Ramirez.
Ronald Koeman’s side landed the 22-year-old striker from Malaga for just £5.2million and he is the only summer signing that has experience in leading the line.
The Spaniard has the versatility to play out wide, but in truth Koeman took a gamble on him adapting quickly to the Premier League and becoming their frontline striker.
However, the plan has massively backfired so far and he has been one of the worst new arrivals at Goodison Park.
Sandro has played in 10 games across all competitions so far for Everton and is yet to get off the mark in front of goal , while also frustrating fans with his lack of influence.
The early signs are that he doesn’t have the physicality to cope with English football and that has forced Koeman to use Oumar Niasse or Dominic Calvert-Lewin as their striker.
Everton took a major risk by only signing promising youngster Sandro to fill the boots of Lukaku as he only has one successful season under his belt.
He did managed to score 16 goals in 31 games for Malaga during the last campaign, but the style of Spanish football is more suited to his game.
The striker has had very little other senior football in his career and was used a fringe player at giants Barcelona.
Everton’s squad now looks extremely vulnerable and they can’t possibly hope to fulfil their aims of competing for a top-six spot if they don’t have a prolific goalscorer in their side.