'People saying we'll be lucky to stay up this year annoyed me - we're more than good enough for Europe': Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall insists Everton can shock critics after 'crisis' summer

At the end of a turbulent transfer window, most observers were in agreement. Everton had the worst summer of any Premier League club and were a team in crisis.

The Toffees missed out on most of their key targets. David Moyes was left with an extremely thin squad with no back-ups in several positions. Their owners, the Friedkin Group, destroyed fan trust by trying to sell Harrison Armstrong, Everton's best academy graduate in years.

As the deadline-day drama unfolded on Sky Sports News and star player Iliman Ndiaye was let go, another key man, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, was sitting on his sofa feeling annoyed.

Not at the club, but at the reaction to it.

‘I’ve seen all of the stuff, all the meltdowns – in all honesty it annoyed me a bit,’ explains the midfielder, who is stepping up as one of the main men for Everton and, who knows, may soon do the same for England.

‘I get where people are coming from, everyone wants to sign everyone and have the perfect squad. But there are still 19 lads in this building who are going to hopefully take this club to good things this year. That was getting disregarded.

As the deadline-day drama unfolded on Sky Sports News and star player Iliman Ndiaye was let go, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall was sitting on his sofa feeling annoyed at the reaction to it all

Dewsbury-Hall, 28, feels at home on Merseyside after a move from Leicester to Chelsea left him on the periphery of Enzo Maresca’s squad

‘I was seeing people saying: “We’ll be lucky to stay up this year." What message is that sending to the lads who are already here?

'I’m not blaming anyone. We get it. It didn’t work. But let’s all be positive – right, it’s done, bang, let's go.’

Dewsbury-Hall feels at home on Merseyside after a move from Leicester to Chelsea left him on the periphery of Enzo Maresca’s squad. Now 28, he is thriving under Moyes and has already starred in several games this season. Everton remain unbeaten in the Premier League and demolished Preston in the Carabao Cup.

In lieu of long-standing club captain Seamus Coleman, Dewsbury-Hall has been voted into a leadership group that also contains new skipper James Tarkowski, Jordan Pickford and James Garner. Being in the group is an achievement given this is just his second season at the club.

The afternoon after deadline day, those leaders were invited to speak up in a group meeting where Moyes told them to block out the outside noise – which was reaching deafening levels by this point.

‘There was a lot of outside noise that you obviously see but he wanted to speak about his views on it,’ says Dewsbury-Hall.

‘There won't be one excuse from any of the players or staff about anything this year. In fact, it'll be the opposite. There’s an opposite mentality of, “OK, not everything's perfect in football, you’re not going to get exactly what you want, but it’s on us now to control what we can control”.

‘When we step out on the pitch, we have to give a good account of ourselves and of the club and I feel like we've done that in the first couple of games. It's not about feeling sorry for ourselves which, by the way, no one has one bit.

‘I know we've got a smaller squad but we've got some really good players. Our starting XI is top, like it's a European starting XI,' Dewsbury-Hall said

Dewsbury-Hall has been voted into a leadership group that also contains new skipper James Tarkowski, Jordan Pickford and James Garner

‘I know we've got a smaller squad but we've got some really good players. Our starting XI is top, like it's a European starting XI. I get it, you need a whole squad, but we've got 17, 18 players at a really, really good level.

‘Obviously you want to add a couple more but in football things are out of your hands and that’s what happened for us. We quickly realised, “Hang on a minute, look around the dressing room… top player, top player, top player”. If we do the right things we can be successful.’

Dewsbury-Hall is loving playing under Moyes and adds: ‘He is not exactly a manager that is constantly telling you: “Well done." I am fine with that completely! He expects a lot so if you do something, it’s like “OK, you’ve done your job”.

‘He’s very on it in terms of what we can do better. He’s already thinking about that, rather than what we’ve done well. He’s trying to cover everything.

‘He said he has been in this position a few times in his career. It is almost like he thrives off that. He is not letting it affect him, not in front of us, so we have to try to repay that.

‘He has been energetic and on it with everything. When you see your gaffer like that, as a player you go, "Wow! I can’t be moping around, I need to be standing up, making things count”. It helps us, the fact that he is always, “Let’s go, bang bang bang”.’

So, on to the two E words: Europe and England.

Everton were three points off the Champions League spots after beating Chelsea on March 20. Europe’s premier competition looked possible, Europa League or the Conference League looked probable. But they did not win another game and ultimately dropped like a stone to 13th.

Can they right that wrong this time around? Asked if Europe is achievable, Dewsbury-Hall says: ‘For sure, definitely.

Dewsbury-Hall received a text message last week to say he is on a long-list of players Thomas Tuchel is watching ahead of the upcoming international camp

‘That was the first year in I don’t know how many where we have been really pushing for Europe until the last day. Having that in our locker is massive. If we are in that position again… it was almost a bit alien to us as a club last year.

‘Everyone might have been a bit jittery behind the scenes, “Oh… oh… oh”. Now if we are in that position again, we will have been in it before, we know what we did wrong and are learning from those mistakes.

‘There are a lot of clubs in Europe this year who have never been there before. Would you have said Sunderland and Bournemouth would have qualified last year? What difference are they to us?

‘You need to set yourself these targets to keep everyone honest and driving standards. It is no good not doing that because, otherwise, people get complacent. We might have got a bit complacent with 10 games to go last season. It won’t happen this time if we are in that position.

‘We are also very motivated about the cups. It’s no secret that we haven’t done anything for a number of years (it will be 32 by the end of this season) and we want to bring this club some silverware. Look at what it did for Newcastle. We want to do the best we can.’

As for England, Dewsbury-Hall received a text message last week to say he is on a long-list of players Thomas Tuchel is watching ahead of the upcoming international camp at the end of September.

‘I know I’m the closest I have ever been now,’ he says. ‘You get your messages two weeks before the squad is announced. I got it for the long-list for the World Cup and you get it now before these ones. I never got it before.

‘Physical things like that tell you that you’re getting closer. It’s up to me. It’s got to be me that forces his hand to choose me. It’s not going to be given to me.

‘It’s a long, long message. It tells you that it’s a legal requirement for us to tell you in advance that you are in contention for a call-up, blah, blah, blah. It’s a good feeling because you think, “Ok, I am close” but then you know you have to keep pushing it to the last minute.

‘You have got to make him think: “I have got to call him up." Hopefully it gets to a point when it happens – and then I will be happy! I’ll keep that message.’

If Dewsbury-Hall puts in another shining performance when Everton go to Tottenham this weekend, it might be worth keeping his phone nearby next Friday.