‘How strong he is’ - Everton star shows support for Dele Alli after emotional interview

Everton goalkeeper Jordan Pickford has backed Dele Alli to regain his form next season following his open and honest interview with the Overlap last week.

Alli revealed personal details about his past and spoke on mental health and how it has affected his career in recent years, but has received tremendous support from the footballing world ever since the video was released last week.

The former Tottenham star was a leading figure for club and country five years ago, but he has since seen his form and career decline. Currently, he’s training with the Everton squad in pre-season out in Switzerland in the hope of impressing manager Sean Dyche.

Pickford spoke out in support of his teammate whilst at the Open Invitational to Sky Sports, revealing that there’s no better place for him than Everton to bounce back after all of his struggles.

He said: “For Dele to come out shows just how strong he is and what he’s gone through, it’s been tough for him and hopefully he’s out the other side of it now and I think Everton’s a great place for him to be because we’re a peoples’ club, hopefully all the players and all the staff around the club can help and get back to the form he was at for Spurs.

“He’s a top player. 40-odd caps for England so we know what type of player he is and hopefully he’ll have a good season next year.”

Earlier during this transfer window, Pickford had been linked with a move away to Manchester United, but their valuation of around £70m, which in turn has put off the Red Devils. The 29-year-old reaffirmed his committment to the club earlier this season, signing a new and improved four-and-a-half-year deal that will see him remain at the club until 2027.

The England number one revealed his thoughts on his Everton future at the club during the interview.

“Definitely,” he said. “I’ve just signed a new contract and I’m happy and my family is happy so now we just want to move forward as a club.

“We should never have been in [the position we were last season. We lost a lot of games that we shouldn’t have ever lost, or we had chances where we should have taken points from more games. It was our own fault that we ended up in that position. But it does show the type of characters we are to get out of that situation.

“We need to knuckle down and work hard on the training pitch.”