DAVID MOYES has warned his Everton players not to expect extra time-off if they play in the London Olympics this summer.
Several Everton players, along with counterparts from most Premier League clubs, have received letters from team GB inquiring whether they want to play for Stuart Pearce’s team.
While the Blues boss is willing to make allowances for players called to take part in the European Championships, he says he will be less flexible with those, like Jack Rodwell, who have also expressed a prior interest in the Olympics.
He said: “Quite a lot of our players have had letters of invitation. Am I worried? I am because there’s a lot of them got all sorts of things going on over the summer so I am a bit worried about the whole thing.
“It’s a real difficult one. It would be hard to say to players not to, but in the same breath this (Everton) is their bread and butter and this is where they get paid.
“They do need holidays and they can’t then be asking for spare time off that doesn’t fit in. If they say ‘I’m playing in the Olympics then I might need a week off to recover’, there can never be anything like that.
“We accept international tournaments. What we’re willing to do to those boys is give them a bit of extra time off because the players definitely need a holiday.
“But I think the players going to the Olympics will have to consider their own holiday time and it couldn’t be eaten into the club’s time.”
A more immediate concern for Moyes is signing a new striker this month, and he will decide soon on whether to hand a deal to US trialist Edson Buddle.
Buddle, 30, is currently back in Germany, where his club FC Ingolstadt 04 are on a winter break, and is awaiting an answer from the Blues before deciding whether to embark on another trial spell in Belgium.
Meanwhile, the ECHO understands that Everton will receive an overall fee of £5.5m for outgoing winger Diniyar Bilyaletdinov.
The Russian international will fly to Moscow today to undergo a medical at Spartak Moscow, who agreed a fee with the Toffees yesterday.
Everton are likely to be paid in installments, with an initial £2.5m up-front and the remaining cash in separate payments.
