davek
Player Valuation: £150m
I think what Dave is saying, albeit in blunt terms, is that Bainesy is past his best.
In terms of being a defensive fullback, I tend to agree with Dave that this is not the best way to describe Baines.
As an offensive, overlapping fullback come wing back, Baines was particularly effective when Pienaar was in his pomp.
Now, if the club were to go out and recruit a top left back in the summer, then Baines would have/need to recover his offensive form of three to five years ago in order to command his place in the starting eleven, or... be the second choice, and better cover for a.n.other than Oviedo was for him.
I stand to be corrected by Dave on this assessment of his post, which was brutal.
Yes, that was a fair assessment.
Sometimes you need to be cruel to be kind mate.
How are we as a club progressing when a player who has - to be very very kind about it - up and down form is an automatic first choice starter? We have gone from a situation where Baines was fighting for his place under competition from Oviedo and Galloway and even Garbutt to one where he is on the team sheet without thinking about it.
He is well past his best and as stated if he is an automatic choice next season we are going nowhere fast. Let's cut to the chase here: Jagielka we all know needs to be culled and will be; well same goes for "one of us" too. There is no room for sentiment in this league.
Get rid ASAP.