Everton confirm James Garner injury timeframe as quadruple update given

Sean Dyche is hopeful that James Garner will make a swift return after missing Everton’s pre-season victory over Preston.

The midfielder was not involved in the 3-0 win, having enjoyed a decent summer campaign so far - scoring in the 2-1 loss at Salford City.

Garner was one of three fresh absentees against Preston. Abdoulaye Doucoure and Seamus Coleman also did not feature with minor issues. There was better news, however, with James Tarkowski, Vitalii Mykolenko and Idrissa Gana Gueye returning to action at Preston.

Dyche, speaking to reporters pitchside at Deepdale after the victory, said: “Doucs got a bit of a knock, we're being careful. Seamus got a bit of a knock, we're being careful. Players coming off today, we're just being careful to make sure they get through this period. Tarky got his first minutes, Myko got his first minutes, Gana is just coming back into it so monitoring that.

“Jimmy's is hopefully going to settle down quick quickly. It's a calf, we're not exactly sure how the body will respond yet but I don't think it will be too long.

“Doucs has got a bit of a tight hamstring, Seamus has a knee that was sort of grumbling a bit so we had to be careful and are monitoring the lads coming back.”

Meanwhile, Dyche confirmed that striker Youssef Chermiti will be miss the start of the 2024-25 season with a foot injury. Dyche added:Youssef, unfortunately, is going to be a longer one. That one is a bit of a blow because he's done great in pre-season and looked sharp. It's going to be a bit longer I'm afraid to say. We'll have to wait and see but it's certainly not going to be a couple of weeks, it will be longer than that,