Three things learnt as Everton inflicted Craig Shakespeare’s first defeat as Leicester City manager

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Could Barkley be putting himself in the shop window?

Perhaps the most frustrating player for Ronald Koeman’s side this season, England midfielder Ross Barkley put in a timely reminder of his potential with an impressive display on Sunday afternoon.

After a season riddled with inconsistency and speculation over his future, he had three shots, created two clear chances, completed seven take-ons and earnt himself a first-half assist.

His vision to pick out the run of Romelu Lukaku for the equaliser was matched by the perfect execution of the in-swinging ball, perfectly landing onto the head of the Belgian forward to draw Everton level in an end-to-end encounter; this was more like the Barkley of two season ago.

Whereas in some games this season he’s gone missing – the Merseyside derby is a prime instance of this – his presence was felt all across the Goodison Park pitch and showed he’s still top quality.

Koeman’s comments in his post-match interview were very intriguing, however, saying that he 23-year-old either has to sign a new deal at the club or start looking elsewhere for his football.

He said:

“We offer him a new contract, and there are two possibilities. One, he signs that contract. If he doesn’t sign that contract then we need to sell the player. It’s not so difficult in my opinion.”

“We try to keep the best players. We spoke a lot about Ross and Rom because they are really important. Most of the time the quality of the players can be the difference between Everton and the opponent, and they played really well.

With this in mind, could Barkley now be upping his game to put himself in the shop window?

It’s certainly possible. Yet for now, until the end of the season at least, his priority will be pushing Everton towards that top-four and putting in the type of impressive display we saw on Sunday.

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