The struggling striker whose signing might signal a change in the way Everton play

Most of the noise coming from Goodison Park in the early weeks of the summer has concerned outgoings and the ownership situation, but a recent tranche of transfer rumours has given Everton fans the first hints as to how they might line up next season – and one story, in particular, hints at a change of direction.

On Thursday morning, French outlet Foot Mercato reported than the Toffees were interested in Marseille forward Iliman Ndiaye, who joined the Ligue 1 side from Sheffield United last summer for a reported £20m after top scoring for the Blades during their promotion campaign in the Championship. Other reports have them looking at Lorenz Assignon (who spent last season on loan at Burnley) and Wilfried Ndidi of Leicester City, but this is the one that leaps out as a departure.

Capable of playing across the front line and deployed by Marseille as a central striker, supporting forward and winger at different times, Ndiaye would provide competition across several positions but is, in many ways, not the kind of player Sean Dyche typically prioritises.

Dyche usually looks for substantial strikers who can serve as a target man, or for wingers who can get upfield quickly from deep positions and who look for crosses and dribbles inside before they look for a pass. Ndiaye doesn’t neatly fit any of those categories – although used to playing at number nine, he isn’t tall or physically imposing and doesn’t look to hold the ball up. He’s reasonably quick and a confident dribbler, but looks for quick passing exchanges as often as he looks to do it himself.

But despite the apparent differences between the player and his prospective manager’s template, Everton are apparently “completely crazy” about him and have followed him for “many months.” That’s also despite the fact that Ndiaye, a childhood Marseille fan, has struggled to impress at the Stade Vélodrome.

Since starring in Sheffield, he has struggled to find that same form at the top level. He managed just four goals in 46 appearances along with five assists and has seen his playing time slide amid criticism from the club’s notoriously hard-to-please fanbase. Marseille’s investment has not paid off, and they would likely be happy to get their money back at this stage in proceedings – although no fee is mentioned in Foot Mercato’s report.

From Everton’s perspective, signing Ndiaye would require some adaptation for either the player or the club. He seems to suit a team who play with a more compact attack, and is at his best in situations where he can either play a quick one-two or take his man on one-on-one over a short distance – positions, in other words, where his modest pace and relative lack of physical strength take a back seat to his nifty technique.

Everton, by contrast, have typically played on the counter-attack under Dyche, looking for direct passes and often asking attacking players to make up large amounts of ground alone or to keep an opposing defender at bay while reinforcements arrive from deeper positions. That simply doesn’t seem to be playing to Ndiaye’s strengths.

It is, of course, plausible that Foot Mercato are flat out wrong about the rumour, but it’s equally possible that Dyche wants to move the team’s style slowly forward into a less reactive and more compact, aggressive side. Ndiaye would work nicely if Everton want to reduce the size of the field when they play and adopt a higher line – assuming, of course, that he can rediscover the form that saw him register 25 goal contributions at Bramall Lane.

There are some ways in which the Senegalese forward fits into what Dyche wants more immediately. He’s an effective and efficient presser of the ball who registers a healthy number of turnovers and is more than happy to do his part of the hard yards off the ball, which is something Dyche wants in his forwards – and his ball-carrying skills are impressive, even if the volume of chances he’s been able to create with them has been relatively modest in this last season. That may, of course, be more an issue of form rather than aptitude.

Ndiaye’s late-season performances, many of which came in the form of late-game cameos, were not inspiring, and have not helped to get the fans in Marseille on side – and if new manager Roberto de Zerbi isn’t immediately impressed, he will be hard-pressed to make the case for the club to keep him on. If Everton want to make this deal happen then it seems very likely that they can do so.

Should they make it happen? That probably depends on whether Dyche really intends to tweak his long-established style to accommodate his skill set. He proved at Sheffield United that there is a player worth persisting with despite his recent struggles – but whether that player is the right one for Everton is less immediately clear.