Tuesday 22 November 2016 13:54, UK
Ronald Koeman returns to St Mary's Stadium for the first time when Everton travel to Southampton for Sunday's Premier League meeting live on Sky Sports.
The Dutchman raised eyebrows when he swapped sixth-placed Southampton for the 11th-placed Toffees in the summer, signing a three-year contract at Goodison Park after two years on the south coast.
Everton sit five points ahead of Southampton after the first three months of the new campaign, but did Koeman make the right call? We weigh up the cases for and against with an expert verdict from Matt Le Tissier…
Koeman cited Everton's "ambition" as the main factor behind his decision, and while summer spending did not come close to the mooted £100m figure, there was evidence of new owner Farhad Moshiri's intentions with the £28m signing of Yannick Bolasie from Crystal Palace.
That deal, by way of contrast, was worth nearly twice as much as Southampton's club-record move for Sofiane Boufal, and it highlighted the difference in financial firepower that convinced Koeman to swap the south coast for Merseyside.
Everton were frustrated in their efforts to sign Moussa Sissoko and Lucas Perez, among others, but Koeman is expected to receive more backing from Moshiri in January. Indeed, he has already expressed an interest in Manchester United's Wayne Rooney and Memphis Depay - targets that would have been out of reach at his former club.
It's not just about signings, either. From Luke Shaw and Adam Lallana to Morgan Schneiderlin and Victor Wanyama, Koeman was powerless to stop a string of key players from departing St Mary's during his time at Southampton.
It was far from ideal, and while Everton did lose John Stones to Manchester City this summer, the £50m deal suited both parties, and their success in resisting Chelsea's efforts to sign Romelu Lukaku was the kind of strong statement Koeman had been craving. The Belgian is one of the Premier League's finest strikers. Southampton simply don't have anyone like him.
Koeman also has plenty of room for improvement in his new environment. The upshot of guiding Southampton to a sixth-placed finish last season was that it would have been a massive task to continue their progression. But while there were suspicions that the Saints had hit their ceiling, there was real scope for improvement at Everton.
It's not been a straightforward start and performances have been mixed, but the Toffees are level on points with sixth-placed Manchester United, five ahead of Southampton and well within reach of the European places.
Everton boast more spending power than Southampton, but Koeman has left behind a club who had mastered the transfer market. The Saints' ability to effectively replace key players with cheaper alternatives allowed them to defy the odds season after season, with Oriol Romeu's recent emergence the latest success story.
Everton hope the appointment of former Leicester recruitment guru Steve Walsh as their director of football will help them establish the same kind of system, but it's not guaranteed, and Everton missed out on a number of targets during the summer. It could take time to make things work, whereas at Southampton the building blocks were already in place.
The same logic can be applied to the argument that Everton have more room to improve. Koeman may have struggled to match last year's sixth-placed finish at Southampton, but he had nurtured stability there. At Everton, on the other hand, he inherited a team in disarray after Roberto Martinez's tenure. There's money to spend, but it's still a challenging rebuilding job.
There is also an argument that Koeman might have been better off building on his impressive work at Southampton and waiting for a bigger offer. Everton are a prestigious club with a proud history, of course, but the move was seen as a sideways step in many quarters. Could another year at St Mary's have opened other doors?
Koeman has made no secret of his ambition to manage his former club Barcelona, but starting over at another middling Premier League club might not be seen as the best way to go about building his CV. By leaving Southampton, Koeman also missed an opportunity to have another crack at the Europa League.
"I said at the time that I was surprised that he almost made a backwards step. I think it's going to be tougher for him at Everton than he thought. No disrespect to Everton but I thought he could have got a bigger move given the great work he did at Southampton.
"Having said that, I think it would be too early for him to regret moving. There's still plenty of time for the investment, assuming it is there. You can understand why he went, with there being more money for him to attract players.
I think it's going to be tougher for him at Everton than he thought.
"I'd expect them to invest in January and the summer as I think he wanted to assess his squad first. If he doesn't spend big then I think that might be a sign that he has been sold down the river a bit.
"It's been a decent start but he's come across plenty of bumps in the road."
