Moyes: I would've sold Fellaini and Baines to United

Following Roberto Martinez’s criticism of Manchester United for their relatively low offer of £28m for Fellaini and Baines, particularly once the bid was made public in the papers, David Moyes has moved to defend himself and the club.

“I definitely do [understand Martinez’s position],” Moyes said. “But I also know that if I’d been Everton manager and Sir Alex had come asking for Leighton Baines and Marouane Fellaini, I’d have found it very difficult to keep them because I always felt the right thing to do was what was right for the players. All we can do is do our job here. Roberto is in a new job and I’m sure he’ll get to understand how Everton work. I know exactly how Everton work. I think I’ve signed every player at Everton, so I know exactly how they work. I speak to Bill Kenwright regularly, we speak most weeks, he was great for me and hopefully he would think that I’d done a good job for him as well. There’s no way there’s any disrespect whatsoever. This is just a case where we’ve made an offer and we didn’t make it public to anybody. The bid, from Manchester United’s point of view, was a private thing and if and when we make a new offer, we’d keep that offer private and confidential as well. Everton are a great club and they are both excellent players. But the transfer window is open and we can make bids and you can say ‘Yes or no’, it’s as simple as that. You are allowed to bid. I think there’s sort of a mixed market at the moment. No one is quite sure where the price is right now. We’ve had offers for players at this club which we feel are quite small, so I can see it where other clubs might be thinking it’s not enough value for their players as well.”