Life after Bolasie

Everton fans are quite used to hearing the term ‘cruciate ligament damage’ so it wasn’t much of a surprise when the innocuous fall from Yannick Bolasie resulted in him being out for the rest of the season.

We’ve been here before, in fact we’ve been here this season as Muhamed Besic is still a few months away from the ligament damage he suffered in pre-season. Whenever I hear those words however, I’ll always think back to the 2009 FA Cup final and what could have been. History doesn’t care about injuries, and the trophy will forever read 'Chelsea’ in 2009, but to have Phil Jagielka, Mikel Arteta and Yakubu all out with cruciate ligament damage was a bitter blow. We couldn’t quite manage without them.

We’ll manage without Bolasie but to pay such a high price for a man who will most likely not be fully ready again until the 2018/19 season is hard to take. That may sound pessimistic in regards to the timescale, but you only have to look at history. Usually with such long term injuries, the recovery of form usually takes about the same amount of time as the injury itself. That’s if form ever recovers at all. With Jagielka it took a long time, Arteta was never quite the same player, and Yakuku defiantly wasn’t. A more recent example of long-term injury can be seen with Bryan Oviedo, who was seen as a very good squad player before his broken leg, but has been very poor since his return. Further afield and the best recent example is Falcao. The serious and underrated part of these types of injuries is that the player often never really comes back.

Some do recover quickly, and let’s hope Bolasie is one of them. In the meantime we have to work out who is going to replace him on the pitch. Kevin Mirallas has been favoured in the starting line up more often than not this season anayway, so it’s Gerard Deulofeu who stands to fortune most from Bolasie’s misfortune, until January at least. The little Spaniard should be thankful for Ross Barkley, because if it wasn’t for him he’d be receiving a lot more discontent from the fans. This could be one of the most important months of his career, if he fails to impress then it’s quite possible he’ll spend his remaining time at the club on the bench.

Everton are apparently looking at Memphis Depay for a January transfer, and the interest in that deal can only be stepped up by the injury to Bolasie. Everton fans wanted the team to strengthen in January, but now time, money and resources will have to be spent replacing a player who we bought for around £25m in the summer.

It’s a blow at a time when Everton were looking for anything positive to use going forward, but the Bolasie injury feels like a step back. Hopefully we can add players in January, as we needed a lot of changes even before the injury, but even more so now.