Midfielder Leon Osman says a raft of summer arrivals has given everyone at Everton a lift.
New manager Roberto Martinez has brought with him from Wigan a pre-season regime focused almost entirely on ball work, while also bolstering his options with the signings of Joel Robles, Antolin Alcaraz, Gerard Deulofeu and Arouna Kone.
And Osman said: “We’ve brought four new signings in already and it’s been impressive. There’s been a momentum with us so far.
“Now we’re all together and have got the rest of our international lads back, we’ve got our full squad and we can start to look forward even more.
“It’s about how quickly now we can all understand what the new manager wants and how he wants us to play. That’s different from being comfortable on the ball. We need to be comfortable in the mind as well.”
As a technically-gifted playmaker, Osman has been quick to embrace the new style of pre-season preparation and added: “Pretty much everything we’ve done so far on the field has been with the ball. All the running has been with the ball and it’s something we don’t usually do. I’ve loved it. You’d be surprised how hard it is with the ball though.
“It’s because you’re concentrating on the running and keeping the ball under good control at the same time. We worked long and hard in Austria, three sessions a day.
“As far as being comfortable and composed on the ball goes we’ve certainly got players capable of being that. That’s a positive.”