Stay in control of the latest Blues news with our Everton newsletter Sign up now Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email

The recent news surrounding Moise Kean is of course frustrating.

He's a young lad. Everyone is a bit bored at the minute and we're running out of ways to keep ourselves busy, but he hasn't done the right thing. Even worse, it's come out on social media.

That's the risk he's taken and the punishment he is being delivered, through this bad press and Everton having stern talks with him.

I know what it's like being young and in the limelight. You do daft and stupid things, and with football off the boredom is probably getting worse.

But there's no excuse for what he's done. It's daft and I hope he's learned from it.

Maybe back in my day and before my day, if social media had been about we'd have acted a lot differently. But if players want to do things regardless, they'll find a way to do it.

That's where his mind his at right now. This is your career, enjoy it to the max but also be professional as much as you can. You want to be remembered for how good a footballer you were, not what you were outside of the game - you can do that for the next for the next 30 or 40 years.

While you're getting paid and being an ambassador for the football club, you need to focus on changing people's opinions on you. Have people focus on your attributes on the pitch rather than off it.

He's a lively character, hopefully this might help him turn a corner a little bit. He's got to look at professionals around the globe who he looks up to.

You wouldn't see other young players doing this. Kylian Mbappe is only 21 years old, for example, and he's doing the right things. Look at the other players who are in the football world and emulate them, while of course trying to fashion your own unique path.

Hopefully it's a lesson he'll have learned the hard way, and he gets the chance to put things right on the pitch over a long period. We haven't seen the best of him since he's come to the club, it's been a difficult time for him moving country and settling in at Everton.

His game time hasn't been as much as he'd like, but maybe he has to start looking at himself. As a player you do look for excuses and towards other players around you that might not have helped you, or coaches or managers.

But at the end of the day you've got to look in the mirror and say, "What do I need to do to get on the pitch? What do I need to prove to the coaches and to my teammates to show I deserve to be here?".

Sometimes it can take a long period of time, because you'll run out of excuses and then it's too late.

What's gone on is sad to see and very disappointing. Not just for himself, but he's put the club in a bad name as well as a representative.

It's not just been him, there have been players at other clubs who have made high profile mistakes. You would have thought that might have been a warning, so there's no excuses from there.

Moving forward now, he's got to get himself on that football pitch. I'm sure he won't have been happy with his performances so far this season, but there's not much he can do about that now.

He's got to, if the opportunity of football comes up again soon, to kick his career on and start playing - and start showing the kind of potential that brought him to the club in the first place.

The club made him a number one target in the summer and Marcel Brands went the extra mile a little bit in bringing him to Everton. He's got one of the most powerful agents in the game behind him as well.

He want be happy being a bit-part squad player here, but he's got to prove to the manager that he's here for the fight and he wants to get more game time.

Sign up for our Everton FC email bulletin The Liverpool Echo sends a daily Everton FC bulletin out via email, with the latest Blues stories to read or catch up on. To sign up for this free service - or any of our other emails like news or what's on - just click here, add your email and click the messages you want to receive.

If he feels elsewhere he will get that game time and he'll be able to develop into who he wants to be, it could be an option that we sell.

But I think a lot of Evertonians are hoping that he will come good. Fingers crossed he can do in a blue shirt, and that's the risk we've got to take.

There's a lot of fans hoping he can become the next legend, the one the fans are singing about on the terraces. He hasn't got it so far, but hopefully he can hit the ground running soon.

But that's down to him and how he reacts to this.

Don't take away from Everton's hard work

In my last few columns I've spoken very highly about Everton's work as a club generally over this lockdown and that hasn't changed.

Everton made it clear from a very early stage on how they were going to adapt to the current situation. They haven't had bad press, they put a marker down on what they were going to do to ease the pressure on staff and in the community.

The manager, the players, Big Dunc as well getting involved in the Blue Family campaign has been fantastic. This Kean incident shouldn't put a dampener on that, but it's something you don't want to see.

The club will continue to support the community, that's Everton in a nutshell. That will carry on regardless.