The Best of Everton's 2025 | OneFootball

As ever, it has been another rollercoaster year for Everton Football Club. But, as 2025 comes to a close, the Toffees find themselves on surer footing than at any stage in the past five years.

David Moyes has overseen a turnaround of on-the-pitch fortunes. Yes, there has been plenty of frustration, and the team is very much a work in progress, but Everton are looking up for the first time since 2020-21, when Carlo Ancelotti stalked the dugout and fans could not attend games.

Everton took 59 points across 39 Premier League matches in 2025, with all of those points coming under Moyes (in 38 games), and clear progress has been made.

Off the pitch, The Friedkin Group have their feet under the table and CEO Angus Kinnear has been tasked with leading the club into a brighter future.

And the last year will go down as a momentous one. Everton left Goodison Park, their home since 1892, and headed off to the magnificent Hill Dickinson Stadium on the banks of the (Royal Blue) Mersey.

So, what better time to look back on the year that was?

Everton's best player

Jordan Pickford has been exemplary; Jack Grealish and Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall have made fantastic impacts since their arrivals in the summer; Idrissa Gueye continues to defy his age and prove it is nothing but a number.

Yet there is one standout performer who deserves this accolade, which goes to Iliman Ndiaye.

A bag of tricks with a lethal eye for goal, Ndiaye has been Everton’s top performer across 2025.

The Senegal attacker leads the way for league goals (10) and goal involvements (12). Unsurprisingly, his tally of 57 dribbles completed is a whopping 41 more than his next-best club-mate.

Ndiaye will be badly missed while away at AFCON, and keeping him fit and firing will be key to Everton having a strong second half to the season.

Everton's best newcomer

A curveball here would be to pick Moyes. He steadied the ship after Sean Dyche departed and has set about trying to change the mentality at the club and have Everton competing at the right end of the table once again.

But Dewsbury-Hall just shades it.

The midfielder has been generally excellent since his signing from Chelsea in the summer. And while Grealish has made headlines, what with his four assists across his first two starts, it is Dewsbury-Hall who makes this Everton team tick.

Everton's most improved player

James Garner looked like he may well have been struggling to cement himself in Moyes’ thinking towards the end of last season. While he was a regular, it was not a rare occurrence to see Moyes infuriated on the touchline when Garner played below his potential.

But his performances in 2025-26 have been superb. Sure, he will never perhaps be truly elite, but Garner is a key cog in this team, whether he is playing in midfield or at right-back (or even left-back, as he did at the start of the campaign).

Garner needs to add more attacking bite to his game in 2026, and as he showed with his superb performance against Nottingham Forest on Tuesday, he is well capable of it. This is a player that should be tallying up 10 goal involvements per season. But he has certainly improved massively over the course of 2025.

Everton's best goal

Ndiaye’s stunning solo goal against Tottenham back in January did come to mind, but there can only be one winner, can’t there?

James Tarkowski sent Goodison Park into bedlam as he volleyed home a thumping volley in the final ever Merseyside derby at the Grand Old Lady, scoring deep in stoppage time to seal a 2-2 draw and spark chaotic scenes that dragged on beyond the final whistle.

A fitting end to the history of the derby at Everton’s old home, and one that will forever be etched in the club’s folklore.

Everton's best moment

Okay, I’m going to cheat here a bit and pick two, though both of them involve the same player, so I reckon I can just about get away with it.

With the Tarkowski screamer against Liverpool already taken, the best moment(s) of 2025 belong to star man Ndiaye.

It was Ndiaye who scored the final two goals at Goodison Park, netting both of Everton’s strikes in their 2-0 win over Southampton back on that sunny, emotional day in May.

And on an equally sunny and equally important day three months later, it was Ndiaye who opened Everton’s account at Hill Dickinson Stadium, setting the Toffees on the way to a 2-0 win over Brighton, in which Pickford also came up big with a great penalty save late on.

What we need to see more of in 2026

There are plenty of options to choose from here, too. Tyler Dibling certainly needs to be given more minutes. There’s a shout for Adam Aznou to at least get a go — or for him to be sent out on loan — while Harrison Armstrong’s immediate future is up for debate.

We clearly need to see more goals. Everton have scored just 20 times in the league this term, and their strikers have just three top-flight strikes between them.

However, this writer really wants to see more of one player, and that player is Jarrad Branthwaite.

It has been so easy for outsiders to gloss over the fact that Everton have been without their best defender all season.

Branthwaite has not, in fact, featured in a competitive game since he limped off against Southampton in the Goodison farewell.

The 23-year-old is a Rolls-Royce of a defender and transforms not only how Everton operate at the back, but also going forward, with his ability on the ball, passing range and recovery pace.

He is nearing a return to fitness, and he cannot come back soon enough. Hopefully, 2026 brings a little more luck on the injury front.