Jack Harrison 11

Having had him on their list of summer transfer targets, Everton moved to sign Jack Harrison from Leeds United on a season-long loan in August 2023.

The Stoke-born wide man had developed a reputation as one of the Yorkshire club's best players as they were promoted back to the Premier League under Marcelo Bielsa's swashbuckling tenure in 2020 and he remained as such during their three-year stay in the top flight before they were relegated back to the Championship on the same day in May 2023 that Everton stayed up by beating Bournemoth.

A late move by Aston Villa almost derailed the Toffees' bid to sign Harrison after both clubs activated a clause in his contract allowing him to leave Elland Road on an initial loan should Leeds lose their Premier League status. However, Villa under new boss, Unai Emery, were seeking a player able to immediately replace the injured Emiliano Buendia but Harrison was carrying a hip injury at the time that was expected to sideline him for anywhere from three to five weeks.

Harrison began his career in the United States after entering the Major League Soccer draft in 2015, being drafted by Chicago Fire and then being traded to New York City FC where he made 55 appearances before moving to sister club Manchester City in January 2018.

He immediately joined Middlesbrough on loan but only played four games and was then loaned to Leeds for three successive seasons starting in the summer of 2018, making 118 League appearances and scoring 18 times, before City eventually agreed to sell him in 2021 for £11m.

Harrison's importance to Leeds was underscored by the fact that he finished third top scorer for them in 2021 with eight goals and second top scorer the following season with the same tally, including a 90th-minute winner at Brentford on the final day that kept Leeds up at Burnley's expense. He scored just six times in 2022-23, however, as Leeds lost their battle to stay in the top division.

Jack had to wait to make his Everton debut due to that pre-existing hip problem but was named in the starting XI to face Villa away in the Carabao Cup Third Round in late September, a game which Everton won handsomely.

He scored his first goal for the Blues in a 3-0 home triumph over Bournemouth the following month, an instinctive first-time effort that he swept under the crossbar from the edge of the penalty area, but would add just two more in the Premier League and one of them was a highly-fortuitous rebound off a touch from Dominic Calvert-Lewin that might otherwise have gone in.

On the whole, playing wide on the right when he had played primarily on the left flank for Leeds, Harrison didn't offer the kind of offensive output that many Evertonians had expected based on his career before joining the Toffees but his workrate and ability to track back made him an important member of the team that avoided relegation with games to spare in 2023-34 despite having eight points deducted by the Premier League for PSR breaches.

It was that suitability to Sean Dyche's system and the low cost that made Harrison a top target to bring back in on loan for 2024-25 after Leeds failed to regain promotion via the playoffs.

FactFile