Everton keen on Tottenham fullback as Seamus Coleman cover

Here’s something you don’t see every day: a Kieran Trippier transfer rumor! This one comes courtesy of the Mirror, who claim that Everton boss Ronald Koeman is keen on luring Trips away from White Hart Lane to act as a temporary replacement for, and eventual competition with, the injured Seamus Coleman.

It’s not a totally dumb idea. Coleman, as we know, had his leg broken while on international duty by Neil Taylor, and Everton really doesn’t have a solid backup option without him. It appears Mason Holgate or Matthew Pennington are the most likely to cover until the end of the season, but with Coleman set to be out for an extended period of time, a right back is probably pretty high on Koeman’s wish list this summer.

Trippier is a decent (if a little erratic) right back, but so long as Kyle Walker is healthy and wearing lilywhite he’s not going to be top fiddle anytime soon. Koeman likes to play a back three with marauding wing backs, so it seems like Trippier might be a decent fit as well.

The usual caveats apply — it’s the Mirror, it’s April, this rumor is probably capitalizing on the fact that Everton have no defensive depth, it’s the Mirror, etc. £6m, the quoted price in the article, would represent about double what Spurs paid for him, but even so I’d expect that in today’s market Trippier would command a larger fee than that.

I don’t hate Kieran Trippier, but I’ve always wondered why we kept him and not DeAndre Yedlin, who is having a good season with Newcastle and is more a like-for-like Walker analogue than Trips. Trippier has had a few solid games for Spurs this season — today against Watford being a very good example — but you don’t have to think to hard to come to the conclusion that there are better fullbacks out there.

This is probably a nothing rumor, but if we’d turn a tidy profit off of Trippier I could live with it, provided Spurs either find improved cover this summer or are ready to promote Kyle Walker-Peters to the big show.