Alex Nyarko has described Everton as "wrong from top to bottom" in what amounts to a fierce parting shot at the Merseyside club.

The unhappy Ghanaian midfielder, who threatened to retire from football after an on-field confrontation with an angry supporter at Arsenal in April, has spoken out in criticism of the Goodison side ahead of his imminent departure this summer.

Nyarko, a ?4.5million recruit from Lens last summer, claimed in an interview with the Observer that illness and injury hindered his on-field efforts for Everton but painted a bleak picture of life with the Premiership strugglers.

"Everton could be like Liverpool," Nyarko said. "They can be top but they are lacking something. There are so many things wrong from up to down." Nyarko, who was criticised by many Everton supporters for an apparent lack of effort, lamented that he "had never had a season like this for being sick and injured".

What is more, he said he had to pay for surgery on a knee problem himself after disagreeing with Everton's recommendation of a course of therapy - and went so far as to claim that Everton sent a doctor to film the surgery in Switzerland because "they didn't trust me". He added: "There is no trust in that club, no truth."

The Ghana international said that manager Walter Smith "changed his attitude to me" and complained that of the club's coaching staff only the recently departed Dave Watson actually spoke to him. Nyarko was particularly scathing in his criticism of Walter Smith's No. 2, Archie Knox.

Recalling Everton's visit to Bradford in November, he said: "Archie was fighting with Stephen Hughes and the other players separated them. It was not the first time. I could not understand this attitude.

"Sometimes I couldn't tell who the manager or the trainer was, Smith or Knox. He acts like he is the manager. It wasn't just me - he was fighting with so many players. Fighting with their fists. In the end I could not be in the same room as him."