Everton midfielder Ross Barkley says that the current midfield options at the club are the best he has seen in a long time.

The arrival of manager Ronald Koeman was marked with several midfield players like Darren Gibson, Tom Cleverley, and Leon Osman leaving the club. Even though there has been a lot of speculation about the future ofBarkley, the England midfielder has ended up staying at Goodison Park, for the time being. He says that managerKoeman has done an excellent job when it comes to improving the midfield. Results have also in favour of the former Southampton manager.

Koeman was expected to have a tough job on his hands when he replaced Roberto Martinez at the start of the season. However, he has performed been able to excel while also managing to keep the existing stars at the club. There was a big danger of losing star striker Romelu Lukaku in the summer, but Koeman appears to have persuaded enough with the Belgian international to keep him at Goodison Park.

Lukaku has been hugely impressive over the last few weeks. He is now one of the top players having scored 16 league goals – only behind Alex Sanchez in the Premier league goalscoring charts.

Everton are expected to strengthen even more in the coming summer transfer window. The club are seventh in the table. “Our midfield options are probably the best since I’ve been at the club. Everyone is an international player. Gaz Barry is a veteran who passes on all his knowledge to the younger lads. He understands different types of games we are going into.We’ve got the likes of Gana, who digs in with Morgan looking for those forward passes.Then there’s the mixture of me, Tom and James [McCarthy]. We’ve got good options,” said Barkley.