ITALIAN JOB

Andy van der Meyde admits he is looking forward to Everton's forthcoming pre-season tour of Italy.

The Everton squad travel to Florence on Monday, only days after returning from St Andrews.

The Dutchman is no stranger to Italy, having spent two years at Inter Milan after transferring from Ajax in 2003. Using his knowledge of Italy, Andy says the Blues will enjoy first-class facilities in Tuscany.

"Florence is a nice city and very warm at this time of the year," van der Meyde told evertonTV.

"The Italian national team train there so it will be good and I am looking forward to it."

The senior squad completed the first leg of the pre-season tours in Scotland last week and the Dutch international confesses it was a tough few days.

"Training was good in Scotland and we did a lot of running," he said.

"Sometimes that can be a bit boring because players just want to play with the ball and not run.

"Alan Irvine said we are going to play with the ball a lot more in Italy. They just don't want us to get injured at the moment."

To watch Andy van der Meyde's interview in full, log on to evertonTV now.

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