David Moyes believes Everton could have challenged for the Premier League title if he had been able to sign a top-level striker.
Moyes returns to Goodison Park with Sunderland on Monday to take on the club he managed from 2002 to 2013.
We had a great team at Goodison but we were missing a centre-forward. We couldn t get the finances to buy one in my last couple of years, he told reporters.
I might be exaggerating but I think, with a top centre-forward, we would have been close to winning the league; we were that good.
I have to be fair. [Everton s chairman] Bill Kenwright was always trying to help me and every penny he had he gave me. I don t have any complaints. It was also a brilliant education.
It s good to have a bit of money but it s also sometimes good to realise you ve got to get out on to the training ground and teach players, build them into a team.
Moyes expects to take a similar approach at Sunderland as he aims to end the club s perpetual struggle against relegation, although one point from the opening three matches of the Premier League season tells a grimly familiar tale.
I see Everton as a very similar club to Sunderland, he said. When I first joined it felt like avoiding relegation every season was good enough.
So we started to change that. I had a budget of £5million a year but we got there in the end. We consistently finished in the top eight.
Sunderland aren t going to be the biggest spenders, just like Everton weren t. It s going to be tough and take time – at least three or four transfer windows – but I want, in my own way, to do a Leicester here.
It might not mean winning the Premier League but finishing in a high position.
