Everton could be looking at targeting the South American transfer market following links to Fluminense striker Kaua Elias
Everton have been linked with Kaua Elias over the past week but could a move for the Fluminense striker finally represent an evolution in transfer strategy from the Blues? Sport Witness cited Homme du Match as reporting that Everton are among a clutch of European sides eyeing the 18-year-old with French club Lille joined by Portuguese giants Benfica and the Blues all “positioning themselves” and “serious competitors,” for a prospect who is described as having “remarkable potential,” and seemingly available for a relatively modest fee of €7million (around £5.85m).
Identifying youthful talent at an early age and then selling on these rough diamonds once they’ve been polished up into proven Premier League performers has become a lucrative plan of action for some of Everton’s rivals. Moises Caicedo was on the Blues’ radar while he was still at his first club Independiente del Valle, but they lost out on his signature when he moved to Brighton & Hove Albion in 2021 for just £4.5million.
A couple of years later, the midfielder would be sold to Chelsea for a British record fee as the Londoners shelled out an eye-watering £115million for his services. With Ecuadorian compatriots, Pervis Estupinan and Jeremy Sarmiento also establishing themselves at the Amex Stadium, the Sussex outfit have proven themselves as offering potential signings from the region a clear pathway.
During his time as director of football, Marcel Brands was eager for Everton to start utilising the South American market. However, on his watch there were no raw gems unearthed but rather established, and often expensive, acquisitions who were already plying their trade in Europe such as Richarlison, Yerry Mina, Bernard, Allan, James Rodriguez and Salomon Rondon and it’s fair to say that most of those were on the recommendations of various incumbent managers rather than the Dutchman himself.
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Last season, when 777 Partners had a deal in place with Farhad Moshiri to buy Everton, their then director of football analytics Mladen Sormaz, who has subsequently become Barnsley’s first sporting director, spoke to the ECHO about his recruitment strategy. He believes that South America is a market that offers great potential for big European clubs and that Brazilians, in particular, are among the best-suited imports when it comes to hitting the ground running in the Premier League due to the combination of their skill set and mentality when it comes to playing in front of large, passionate crowds who have significant expectation levels.
The controversial Miami-based private investment firm, who failed to sink their teeth into the Blues before their global empire collapsed, had a club in Brazil (Vasco da Gama) and the same goes for John Textor (Botafogo) who also tried to acquire Everton and last week claimed he was 24 hours away from striking a deal before the Friedkin Group came back in. The Missouri-born mogul is seldom short of a sound bite, and he received a rap on the knuckles from the current top brass at Goodison Park for speaking publicly about what manager Sean Dyche’s appetite for working with South American players might be like, while he also denied reports he was planning to replace the current Blues boss with Palmeiras head coach Abel Ferreira if he took control.
This latest link suggests Kevin Thelwell and his team are attempting to cast their net a bit wider though, but just what sort of player is Elias. This correspondent spoke to Rio de Janeiro-based journalist Rodrigo Calvozzo to find out.
He told the ECHO: “Kaua Elias is a promising young player, but he still needs to improve a lot, which is understandable given his age. He has a lot of potential and a strong desire to improve, but I still see him as far off the great forwards of the Brazilian national team.
“He knows how to take advantage of his good positioning in the box, but when he drops back, he faces some difficulties and therefore does not follow up on the team’s advances.
“I don’t see him as Romario, Ronaldo or Careca. Right now, he is a box player, closer to the style of Jardel or Elber, who played for Bayern.”
Elias seems to have come a long way in a relatively short space of time given that he wasn’t even in Fluminense’s first team when they won the Copa Libertadores (South America’s equivalent of the Champions League) a year ago. Calvozzo said: “His presence in the side at the moment is due to the fact that Fluminense are having a terrible season this year.
“Fluminense’s two main attackers have had problems in 2024. German Cano, was absent for almost five months and John Kennedy (who netted the winning goal against Boca Juniors in the 2023 Copa Libertadores final only to get sent off for jumping into the crowd), has had disciplinary problems and only now seems to be recovering.
“That’s why Kaua Elias’ presence was a necessity. Even though he was called up as an emergency player, he improved the attack by scoring goals and showing that he has the personality to take on this responsibility in a difficult moment.”
The striker’s road to the top had a curious start as his grandfather who raised him, overcame concerns over the cost of making the 2,000km return journey to go for trials because he claimed he had heard a ‘divine voice’ instruct him while napping. Calvozzo said: “Kaua is from Uberlandia, a small city in Minas Gerais and he joined Fluminense when he was 11 years old and was brought to him by his grandfather, through an acquaintance from the club’s youth teams.
“Jose Elias told Globo Esporte that he really listened to this divine voice and made sure to follow his intuition. He recalled: ‘One Saturday, I came home from work, went to the fridge, drank two cans of beer, had lunch and lay down on the couch in the living room to rest. Just as I was starting to doze off, the Holy Spirit of God came and whispered in my ear three times to take Kaua to Fluminense, so I called the scout I knew and said we’d be there on Monday.’”
At this fledgling stage of his career, Elias, who has scored seven goals in 39 senior matches for Fluminense to date, needs to show a capacity to learn and Calvozzo believes he has that, even though he remains concerned by the number of players leaving Brazil at such a tender age. He said: “Kaua is a very disciplined player and has never had any problems off the field. Furthermore, he takes responsibility and is not afraid.
“When he scored his first goal, at a very difficult time for Fluminense in the season, he said: ‘You can trust the boys and we will bring results.’
“Another fact that is worth mentioning is that he has a reputation for listening to more experienced players. German Cano is a forward that Kaua always says he wants to listen to, as well as Thiago Silva, Marcelo and Fred, who he considers idols.”
He added: “Players being sold so early to European clubs is one of the biggest questions that exists in Brazilian football today. Many believe that the decline of the national team is due to this phenomenon, because many young players do not identify with the country’s clubs, and also, because they start to have characteristics of European players, which is not well regarded in Brazil.
“This departure of very young players means that many of them return after not having success in Europe while still young, so that they can complete their professional maturity and then seek a second opportunity or establish themselves in Brazil as qualified professionals.”
