Everton had banked the transfer. By kick-off at the Vitality Stadium on Saturday, Nottingham Forest’s offer of £35 million plus add-ons for Harrison Armstrong was signed off at boardroom level and the teenager had permission to travel for a medical, according to reporting by John Percy of The Telegraph that was echoed across the national press.

By Sunday, none of it stood. The Friedkin Group pulled the plug on the sale and Armstrong was told he would be staying on Merseyside.

Chants before, during and after Bournemouth

The decisive noise came from the away end. Everton drew 1-1 at Bournemouth on 29 August and travelling supporters chanted Armstrong’s name before, during and after the match, demanding the board abandon negotiations with Forest. The reaction was understood to be a major factor in what followed.

David Moyes had already made his position awkwardly public in the pre-match press conference.

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“There’s been an offer. Apart from that I don’t think there’s much else I can say, it’s a club decision. We don’t want to lose anybody and we still need to add players to what we’ve got,” he told reporters.

The Everton manager was blunter after the fans made themselves heard.

“I think you always have to consider supporters; supporters aren’t always wrong,” Moyes said, according to Sport Bible’s reporting on the aftermath.

The Friedkin Group’s call

Ownership had the final word. Chairman Dan Friedkin and the Friedkin Group made what Sport Bible described as a “unanimous call” to keep Armstrong, weighing supporter anger against Armstrong’s value to the project and his status as a homegrown asset. Moyes, who has spent the summer arguing the squad is too thin rather than too crowded, wanted him kept.

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The reversal is not just an internal U-turn. Everton needed sales before the Premier League summer window closes on 1 September to satisfy financial rules, and Armstrong was set to be one of them. The club will now look elsewhere to raise funds before the deadline.

Forest still need a midfielder

Nottingham Forest are left short. The bid for Armstrong was designed as a replacement for Elliot Anderson, sold to Manchester City earlier in the summer, and Vítor Pereira’s squad still has that hole to fill with days left in the window.

Armstrong, a Liverpool-born England youth international, only returned this year from a loan at Preston North End that was cut short in January. He signed a new long-term Everton contract and was seen inside the building as the kind of academy graduate the club is trying to build around, not sell.

The window closes on Tuesday, 1 September.

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