Denise Barrett-Baxendale sets Everton target of winning the Premier League
Chief executive Denise Barrett-Baxendale has set Everton the target of winning the Premier League and playing Champions League football in their new stadium in the next decade.
Barrett-Baxendale was appointed just eight months ago - her second day in charge she sacked manager Sam Allardyce and director of football Steve Walsh - and having undertaken a root-and-branch review has overseen significant changes in the structure of the club at all levels.
She is also highly ambitious and as part of her 'new broom' approach has laid down a series of challenging targets, befitting the status of their proposed new £500million stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock, she wants the Toffees to aspire to.
However, in order to do that they have to dramatically improve their revenue streams as for every £1 available for top-six clubs to spend Everton currently have 41p.
In her maiden address to the club's general meeting, held at Liverpool's Philharmonic Hall, Barrett-Baxendale told assembled shareholders the vision was to be "challenging at the top of the Premier League and competing at the highest level in European competitions".
"Ultimately this means challenging for domestic titles and trophies, not only to win cups, but to win Premier League titles too," she added.
"It means competing regularly in the Champions League and it means doing all of this in a world-class, world-renowned football stadium.
"This is an extremely challenging goal. It is very much a long-term goal for our club but it is vital we are ambitious and that we deliver performance on and off the pitch that drives our club forward to achieve our ambitions.
"I acknowledge our vision is challenging, and the barriers to entry are indeed daunting, but we are Everton and we must all be focused and driven to meet that challenge."
The man charged with overseeing the move towards a Premier League title challenge is not manager Marco Silva but current director of football Marcel Brands.
Barrett-Baxendale announced at the meeting Brands, who arrived in May to replace Walsh, had been appointed to the board of directors and has been put in charge of promoting a long-term, club-wide strategy.
Everton have learned lessons from the failure of the Walsh experiment, who was the club's first director of football in their history, and Barrett-Baxendale felt putting their faith in Brands was the right thing to do.
"This appointment (to the board) further cements the importance and permanence of the position of director of football within our structure," she said.
"Marcel is now responsible and accountable for delivering the long-term, holistic, football strategy and principles from the academy through to the first team."