Everton’s transfers this summer, both incomings and outgoings, have been brilliantly thought-out and engineered with incision.

This gave Kevin Thelwell the understanding that their newfound relative sustainability would allow them to enter the market with the assurance that any fees paid would not result in another PSR sanction.

Additionally, Ben Godfrey, Lewis Dobbin, and Amadou Onana’s sales contributed to this.

But it seems like further cuts are needed if they are to make one or two more final acquisitions to fully complete Sean Dyche’s roster.

Thankfully, two first-team players could perhaps be the next to go, according to iNews.

Everton willing to sell two first-team players

This represented a huge transfer update from the report, which had previously revealed Everton’s interest in Kalvin Phillips before indicating that Armando Broja was eager to join Everton.

Perhaps a more subdued update on this possible double departure would be appropriate, though, given it offers some insight into Michael Keane and Mason Holgate’s futures.

The text says it all: “Everton are also looking to shift players out, as both Michael Keane and Mason Holgate have become available.”

While the latter came for £30 million and has spent seven arduous years with the club, the former moved to Goodison Park as a teenager and was named the team’s Players’ Player of the Year for the 2019–20 campaign.

Everton should have sold Michael Keane a long time ago

Even if Holgate is impulsive, careless, and completely unreliable, the aforementioned profile at least shows a period of time when both Everton staff and players held him in high regard.

He has now found it difficult to leave his impact at Southampton and Sheffield United.

Though these loan stints suggest the club had not given up on the 27-year-old entirely, there was always a chance that he may regain that form.

But Keane has never really relished that run of consistent success, always being a slow member of the team who could make a costly mistake that would sink the team.

Like most of the current team, he was at the top of his game under Carlo Ancelotti, and as such, he persuaded the club to invest in a lucrative long-term contract that would have tied him down until 2025.

It’s arguable that his departure would have been approved long ago if it weren’t for this contract.

Thankfully, it is unlikely that we will see much of Keane in what will undoubtedly be his final season because Jake O’Brien has joined the team.