David Moyes on Everton's Ownership and Squad Challenges

David Moyes has revealed he has never met or spoken to Everton owner Dan Friedkin since returning to the club in January 2025 – despite the American having been in charge for almost a year.

Friedkin, head of The Friedkin Group, completed his takeover in December 2024 but has not been at Goodison Park for a home game since. The club is effectively being run from Houston, and the distance – literal and figurative – has become a central theme in a turbulent summer on Merseyside.

A distant owner, a thin squad

The question of who actually calls the shots at Everton dominated the transfer window. By the end of it, the picture looked even murkier.

Speaking before Sunday’s meeting with Manchester United, Moyes was asked directly whether he had met or spoken to Friedkin at any point in the 20 months since he was reappointed. His reply was blunt.

No.

Day-to-day control rests with Friedkin’s son-in-law, Rishi Majithia, who works alongside chief executive Angus Kinnear. For Moyes, that hierarchy is clear.

“My real contact is Angus,” he said. “Angus is the one who I would go to see. Rishi is the next one and then the head of the Friedkin family in America.

“I don't really get any direct conversations with them, but I do through Rishi, he is the one I would speak to.”

While the ownership structure stays at arm’s length, the consequences have landed squarely on the pitch. Everton closed the window with just 18 senior players. One recognised striker. One right-back. One left-back. For a club of Everton’s size, it is a squad list that reads like a risk.

Armstrong, anger and a late U-turn

Supporters made their feelings plain at Bournemouth last weekend.

News broke during the game that Everton had accepted a £40m bid from Nottingham Forest for Harrison Armstrong, one of the club’s most highly rated assets and an England Under-19s midfielder. The reaction in the away end was instant and furious.

The club eventually pulled out of the deal, but the damage to trust lingered. Fans were left asking who had sanctioned the move and what direction the board was taking.

Moyes publicly sided with them over the Armstrong situation, stressing that Everton were “managed by an Evertonian” and that “supporters aren't always wrong”. It was a deliberate alignment with a fanbase that feels decisions are being made above their heads.

The Armstrong saga was not the only flashpoint. On deadline day, Beto was sold to Fiorentina before Everton had secured a replacement centre-forward. USA international Folarin Balogun then backed away from a proposed move from Monaco at the last moment on Tuesday, leaving Moyes with a single senior striker going into the autumn.

Moyes stays in the fight

Behind the scenes, the manager knows the club’s structure needs work. He did not hide from that.

“We've got new owners in who are still feeling their way in the club,” he said. “I think if we get to know each other more it will get better.”

The uncertainty has inevitably prompted questions over his own future. Moyes, though, shut down any suggestion he might walk away from the chaos at a club he previously led to multiple top-five Premier League finishes between 2002 and 2013.

“Everton's different,” he said when asked if he had considered quitting. “I wouldn't have come back for anybody but Everton.”

That sense of belonging is now being turned outward, towards the stands.

“I think the club here has had enough days where the people find a way of recovering. People saw the face of Evertonians last week and it can be really powerful. I would expect them to be really powerful now.

“But powerful for the team, powerful for the players. What we're going to need from them is extra because we're short, so we need them. If they're not with us, then it's terrible. And they are with us, I believe they are with us.”

An absentee owner in Houston, a skeletal squad on the ground, and a fanbase simmering but still engaged. Moyes has nailed his colours firmly to the Everton mast. The question now is whether the people above him will step forward and match that commitment.