‘Nutcase’: £3.5m player absolutely loved the abuse Everton fans gave him last season

Arnaut Danjuma ‘loved’ the abuse he received from Everton fans at Goodison Park last season.

That’s according to his agent Michael-Moses Jarman, who told talkSPORT that the winger enjoyed the abuse he received when warming up during Everton’s draw against Tottenham Hotspur in April.

Danjuma looked set to join the Toffees during the January transfer window after agreeing a switch to Merseyside on loan from Villarreal, however Frank Lampard’s sacking left the move in turmoil and he instead decided to join Tottenham Hotspur.

After a disappointing stint in North London that saw him manage only one start in the Premier League, Danjuma has now finally completed a move to Everton after joining on a

The Dutchman’s arrival has brought plenty of criticism due to his failed switch, with the Toffees supporters letting Danjuma know exactly how they left when the two sides met in April.

“He was playing against Everton [last season], he was on the bench but warming up in the corner. A goal went in, 86th minute, I think it was Michael Keane who scored.

“He called me up after and said, ‘Mike, it felt like 40,000 people were screaming in my ear’, they were just hurling abuse at him. He was like, ‘I love it, this is a club!’

“So he’s actually looking back and he’s being saying to me that it’s second time lucky for him, you know?”

Will Arnaut Danjuma receive a hostile reception from Everton fans?

Everton fans were rightfully very angry at Arnaut Danjuma in the second half of last season and he deserved the abuse he got – especially when he had joined Spurs to effectively warm the bench.

However, the 26-year-old is clearly fond of the Toffees as he was willing to look a bit stupid and sign them this summer instead.

There will be a select few that won’t accept Danjuma’s arrival and will continue to abuse him as they host Fulham in their Premier League opener, but all should be forgotten if he takes to the pitch and gives it his all for his new club.

Everton’s long-running pursuit of El Bilal Touré, their primary striker target this summer, appears to have reached its conclusion, with news appearing that the 21-year old Villarreal player is poised to join former Blue Ademola Lookman at Atalanta. Consequently, the club’s attention has turned to other solutions to their problems of depth and reliability up front.

Leicester City’s Kelechi Iheanacho is one, but another is the oft-linked Boulaye Dia, recently signed by Serie A side Salernitana following a highly successful season-long loan from… Villarreal.

Showing French Promise

The then 21-year old Dia broke into the Stade Reims first team during the 2018-19 season, after demonstrating an impressive eye for goal in the lower reaches of French football. By the following campaign, he’d established himself as a regular in the side, but came of age in 2020-21, scoring 14 league goals in 36 appearances, one-third of the club’s total. Such form earned the forward a €12m move to La Liga outfit Villarreal in the summer of 2021.

Troubles in Spain

Dia’s single year in Spain proved a frustrating one. Initially paired with Gerard Moreno, a slow start culminated in a knee injury which sidelined the Senegal international for a month. Upon his return, he continued to struggle for form, until finally scoring three in two matches at the turn of the year – immediately before heading off to AFCON. He returned from international duty to find himself on the bench, behind none other than new Everton man Arnaut Danjuma.

The French-born forward never really got going again, although he did partake in his first taste of Champions League football, earning limited minutes but signing off with a start – and a goal – in Villarreal’s semi-final second leg defeat to Liverpool. So, with five goals (5.4 xG) and five assists (2.4 xA) in 25 La Liga appearances (just 13 starts) Dia moved again, this time on loan to Italian side Salernitana last summer.

An Italian Relaunch

If a move to Spain had never really got going, then the opposite proved true last season. Hardly one of the Italian game’s heavyweights, Salernitana had barely escaped the drop during the previous campaign (their first in the top flight for 23 years) and had scored a pitiful 33 goals. Dia got to work improving that side of things immediately, firing three goals in his first three starts, following a debut from the bench.