January 10th in Sassuolo–that was the last time Evan Ferguson played for Roma. The Irish forward has been absent ever since being substituted for Stephan El Shaarawy before half-time in Roma’s 2-0 win. He’s not truly missing since we know his whereabouts, but ongoing injury problems have disrupted his first—and probably only—season in Rome. We hoped he would have a breakthrough in 2025-2026, but it’s turning into a nightmare for everyone involved.
And the situation has actually worsened. Ferguson
has already returned to Brighton, not because his loan got prematurely cut like Leon Bailey’s. With his rehabilitation dragging on for too long now, Roma and Brighton agreed it was best to send Ferguson back to England for further medical tests.
At one point, we all recognized Ferguson’s enormous potential, praising him as one of the Premier League’s top talents and comparing him to Robbie Keane. Described as quick, tall, and deadly in the penalty area, with keen intuition, we believed Gasperini would be the right coach to elevate Ferguson to stardom and realize that potential, similar to his success with numerous Atalanta players. However, something went wrong along the way.
It seems Gasperini became less enamored of Ferguson as the season progressed and even openly criticized him. Poor training sessions, lack of motivation, ongoing injury issues—who knows what was happening behind the scenes? Whatever the case, GPG demanded fresh players in the January transfer window, leading to the signings of Robinio Vaz, Bryan Zaragoza, Lorenzo Venturino, and, of course, the man of the moment, Donyell Malen.
Unlike Ferguson, Malen quickly adapted and, by March, scored more goals than Ferguson did in the previous seven months. Gasperini also praised Malen as the missing piece of the puzzle, which doesn’t bode well for Evan or Artem Dovbyk, who has been dealing with his own injury issues.
It’s safe to say Evan’s season, and Roman career, is as good as done after only 22 appearances and roughly 1000 minutes. Maybe he will get some minutes at the end of the season as a farewell. There is no way Roma can or wants to exercise that € 40 million option in his loan deal. Especially with Malen’s rise and the hefty sum Roma already paid for Vaz. It’s simply too risky for a broken player. Sometimes it’s better to part ways and accept that it’s not meant to be.
Ferguson played the full 90 minutes only twice this season, against Stuttgart and Como. And with Roma missing Dybala and Dovbyk for larger portions of the season, the club’s entire frontline has been in the infirmary at various points this year. That’s manageable for clubs like Manchester City or Bayern Munich, but for a club like Roma, that’s potentially damaging in the race to return to the Champions League.
It’s a shame that in the end Ferguson will be grouped with players like Azmoun, Ibarbo, Tavano, Solbakken, and Defrel. Clearly, he’s more talented than all of those players. However, he was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. We tried, but it didn’t work out. Ferguson now needs to aim for a hopefully better 2026-2027 season. Meanwhile, Roma can enjoy Malen developing into a Serie A superstar.
Get well soon, Evan. Let’s hope we hear from you again when you lead Brighton or Everton to the CL.
