Expert view on Sean Dyche: what he’ll bring to Everton and his ideal January signing

Sean Dyche is set to be announced as Everton’s new manager.

Dyche will return to work after he was relieved of his duties by Burnley last April.

The 51-year-old spent more than 10 years in charge of the Clarets. During that time, he guided the club to two Premier League promotions and a finish as high as seventh in the 2017-18 - which saw Burnley qualify for the Europa League.

Now Dyche is tasked with ensuring that Everton can avoid relegation to the Championship with 18 fixtures remaining.

To get the lowdown on Dyche and what he’ll bring to Goodison Park, we spoke to Dan Black who is head of sport for the Burnley Express.

First of all, what can fans who haven't seen Sean Dyche's teams on a frequent basis expect?

Dyche embodies that type as a coach and manager who is just hard working. He adopts a very commonsensical and pragmatic approach filled with hard work, consistency and planning. He likes to do his research so if something does go wrong, it's not through a lack of work or trying. He covers all bases going into every game and training session.

When he first started at Burnley, his philosophy was that the minimum requirement was maximum effort. His team and players will always give everything. Another thing he demanded is his players always come out of games with sweat on their shirts - whether they were a defender, midfielder or attacker. They defend from the front, play energetically, play positively, make life hard for the opposition and balance that graft with craft as well.

A moment that embodies that was the 24-pass move at Goodison Park which Jeff Hendricks finished off. It was a 1-0 win. The clean sheet reflected the hard work and the goal reflected the craft.

He wants good people and players and everyone working in the right direction. At Burnley, Dyche worked by the mantra of 'Legs, Hearts Minds'. That connected everybody and filtered through the club to the community. Burnley is a working-class town and wanted his team to reflect those hard-working values. That's what he'll do at Everton.

The layman may associate Sean Dyche with someone who wants to play direct football and sets up his team well. Would that be a fair assessment or a disservice?

Dyche has got a reputation of being old-school - in the most extreme terms a dinosaur. It just isn't true. He's probably one of the most knowledgeable coaches in the game. Some of the opinions of him are a massive disservice.

His value, traditions, philosophy and culture rounded the club into a very positive place. He had 11 years and it just shows the impact he had there.

Dyche will be consistent in his team selections and framework and will stick to very similar personnel but only to try to ensure it works. If it doesn't work straight away, he will persevere for a bit but if not then he'll adapt things to get positive outcomes.

In terms of formation, what can be expected?

I'd be surprised if it wasn't 4-4-2 or 4-4-1-1 but it depends on the players he has available and sees fit to get them into a system that works.

Dyche will be reunited with James Tarkowski and Michael Keane in defence, who he was very big fans of at Burnley and got the best out of those two. Then you've got Conor Coady so does he go with three centre-backs to try to solidify in a fight for survival?

He won't just come in and pre-determine that he's going to play 4-4-2. He'll look at the squad available to him and come up with a tactical approach that best suits those players and what they hope to achieve.

Everton desperately need attacking players. What sort of players would he like?

First and foremost, he'll work with the squad he's got and see if he's got enough there to beat the drop to the Championship. I think he will like Dominic Calvert-Lewin, he can play a big part then you've got Neal Maupay who could play off him.

Whether he can get a tune out of those two could be massive as, on his day, Cavlert-Lewin is an exceptions striker and a goalscorer. If he can get a partnership to click, it makes a massive difference because Everton haven't been scoring enough.

Dyche gave Dwight McNeil his chance at Turf Moor and was unplayable for the first couple of seasons. If you can get that player at Everton, linking up with the forwards and putting the chances on a plate for them, those are the situations that can change seasons around.

Would you back Dyche to get it right in the transfer market for Everton?

Yeah. There have been moments he has got it right and some he's got it wrong. That's management and you learn from your mistakes. His record signing was Ben Gibson for around £14-15 million which didn't work out. But then you look at players like Chris Wood, Maxwell Cornet, Nathan Collins and Steven Defour, who was a revelation.

Dyche also brought Joey Barton in, who helped earn promotion and then Premier League survival. He's more than capable of working without cash but with money, he has got it right on quite a few occasions.

When you're in a tough situation, you need someone with the right values and philosophies to dig you out and Dyche is certainly up there. If you want someone to get you out of a hole, you back him.

In general, what would his ideal January signing be?

He just wants someone who believes in themselves, backs themselves and is willing to work as part of a team.

Dyche had Chris Wood running the channels. That's not Wood's strength but it's the kind of player he turned Chris Wood into and would do anything to help the team.

If a ball was a lost cause, he'd be chasing it and putting pressure on the full-back to make sure the ball wasn't coming back in the wrong direction. It was the same for all of them.

You look at Danny Ings, Ashley Barnes and Andre Gray. They all put a shift in to try to make sure their side came out on top. Look at the goal records of the four just mentioned. They were putting the work in and, at the same time, combining and finishing chances off. Dyche just managed to get a tune out of these players and once one goal goes in and the second, it just builds from there.