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Roberto Martinez insists Arouna Kone will prove a hit with Everton FC fans once he is over his injury nightmare.

The Ivory Coast striker joined the Blues last summer for £6m but has been sidelined since mid-October with a knee injury.

Kone made just six appearances last season and has yet to feature in any of the Blues warm-up games this summer.

Martinez says the 30-year-old is edging closer to a return and the Everton manager believes that when fully fit, the former Sevilla and Wigan Athletic striker will prove the doubters wrong.

And the Blues boss, who has bolstered Everton’s attack with the club record signing of Romelu Lukaku this summer, sees the experienced Kone flourishing in the Europa League.

“He is not the forgotten man in our eyes,” Martinez told the ECHO.

“He is a figure that is very much in our plans and he is an understood figure because he has gone through such a horrible time.

“He signed for a new club and wanted to show what he can do but he hasn’t been able to do that.

“It has been frustrating for everyone but he is training well now.

“He is right where he should be.

“It was a very serious injury and it is just about assessing when he will be available to play but he will be important this season.

“There are going to be so many games where his experience – playing for many important teams over his career – is going to be very beneficial for us. He is not forgotten at all.”

Asked if he felt Kone would surprise Everton fans when he returns, Martinez said: “Yes.

“He will because he hasn’t been able to show what he is as a footballer. He is a strong target-man who can hold the ball up well and link up play.

“His appreciation of the players around him is quite impressive for a target-man because you don’t normally see that type of appreciation.

“Then as a finisher, he scores goals and those are the qualities that I don’t think anyone has seen yet.

“He is working really, really hard to be himself and show what he can do to help the team.

“It is exciting in a way to see the Arouna Kone we know at Everton but it is frustrating as well because he has suffered a lot and you can imagine that a person of his own standards, he has found it very, very difficult not to be able to show what he can do.”

Kone has played for clubs in his Ivory Coast homeland, then Belgium, Holland, Spain and Germany as well as England.

And Martinez believes the forward’s experience of facing teams from across the continent will help the Blues when they return to European competition later this season.

Everton will not learn who they face in the group stage of the Europa League until the end of this month but Martinez knows that a fit and firing Kone can be their secret weapon abroad.

“The players who know those European games have been in my thoughts all the way through,” Martinez said.

“Mo Besic is one, Gareth Barry is another and they have the understanding of playing in Europe.

“When Arouna Kone signed for Sevilla he became that sort of player.

“He has played in Europe and has been successful in Europe and is someone who is going to be important for us to go anywhere in the Europa League and help us perform. He will help us.

“It is just about having him physically right now and being 100 per cent before we put him on the pitch. Let’s see when that day arrives.

“The end of September, the end of October, whenever it is, we need to make sure he is

100 per cent ready.”