Yakubu hits back at Gibson comments

Sep 29 2007 by Chris Beesley, Liverpool Daily Post

AYEGBENI YAKUBU has hit back at comments from Middlesbrough chairman Steve Gibson that he ‘switched off’ halfway through last season.

Gibson made his remarks when the Nigerian striker completed his record £11.25million transfer to Everton last month but as Yakubu prepares to face his former team at Goodison Park tomorrow – a game Everton go into with 11 injury worries – he has revealed that he believes the Riverside Stadium chief’s comments were unfair.

At the time, Gibson declared: “We got 18 very good months out of him. He switched off half way through last season, we’ve never really been able to understand why, but sometimes you’ve just got to move on and that’s what we decided with Yakubu.”

However, having netted 35 goals in 88 starts for Boro and helping them to reach their first UEFA Cup final, Yakubu feels the remarks were not very gracious.

He said: “It’s unfair. I was there for two years and scored a lot of goals.

“It is ridiculous to say I’d switched off.

“At the beginning of the summer they didn’t want to sell me. At the end of the transfer window they decided to sell me.

“I said to them I’m not happy and I want to leave because I’m looking for a new challenge. I’m looking for a club that has ambition and I think Everton has ambition.

“I don’t have anything against the chairman and the people there I just want to play at a club that has ambition, that’s why I had to leave. I was disappointed for him to comment on that but it’s life and he had some opinions to say. I call some of the players there to ask how they’re doing but we have to move on.”

Despite reaching a European final in his first campaign at the club, consecutive bottom-half finishes of 14th and 12th in the Premier League convinced Yakubu that he needed to join a club with more loftier aspirations and he declares this is why he came to Goodison Park.

He said: “I want to play for a club that plays in Europe and at this moment I don’t think they’ll get into Europe.

“Everton want to be in Europe.

“They want to play in the UEFA Cup, they want to play in the Champions League and they want to win the league.

“I want to be a part of a club that has ambition.

“I made the right decision to come to this place and I’m not regretting it. I think the ambition here is higher than at Middlesbrough.”

Everton go into tomorrow’s encounter buoyed by their 3-0 Carling Cup victory at Sheffield Wednesday in midweek but they have lost their last two Premier League fixtures and are just two points above the Teessiders in the table.

Yakubu believes it will be an intriguing encounter but is in no doubt where his loyalties lie now.

He said: “I think it’s going to be a good game.

“I don’t have anything to prove, I just want to go out there and get the three points. I will celebrate if I score, it’s just a normal game. Life goes on, they have to move on and I have to move on too.”

Everton manager David Moyes goes into the game with an entire ‘team’ of 11 players injured.

Long-term absentees James Vaughan and Tim Cahill have been joined on the treatment table in recent weeks by Tim Howard, Mikel Arteta and Thomas Gravesen.

Moyes now has fresh worries over Joseph Yobo and Lee Carsley, who have both been ill this wee; Andrew Johnson, who has picked up a groin strain in training; Tony Hibbert and Nuno Valente, who suffered a groin strain and foot injury respectively in the Carling Cup tie while reserve goalkeeper Iain Turner is set to undergo an operation on his hip.