Surely that's hindsight? When we sold him, he'd played 30 games in the 2017-18 season - started just 9, on as sub. 21 times, substituted 5 times and scored just 3. That's 30 appearances in total, so I don't think anybody's suggesting his season was glandular fever-wracked. I doubt if anybody could forsee how he'd step up in the PL. He's now in a team which is better - arguably in every position - than we have. He had the odd stellar moment with us - his goals at Millwall and Leeds, his nutmegging of Jack Cunt etc. and I remember saying to a mate that 'Brooks was one of those very rare players who can get you out of your seat.' But would he have performed consistently over a whole season in the Championship? There was precious little evidence of that based on last season.
Sure it hurts to see DB playing like he did last night, but just watching the highlights on MoTD last night, the PL has plenty of 'stellar, young talent' - who will all have started at a lower level.
Enjoy DB whilever he's on display, it's better than the standard 'He was crap, anyway' when a player is sold from many teams. If he'd have progressed at the Blades in the same way he has at Bournemouth, he would have been a 'gilded bird in a cage' at United.
And that's how it works. DB will be very rich but, as money increases, so lifestyle expands - cars, houses, birds etc. Brooks will win nothing at Bournemouth, he'll look enviously at players playing in front of 50, 60, 70 thousand fans, earning far more than he does at present and will move to a truly 'big' club.
And the Bournemouth fans will say 'Why did we sell him?', 'Couldn't we have held onto him?' and 'We gave him away'...
On a Cherries-related note, am I the only one who thinks Nathan Aké is a waste of space - a poor man's David Luiz? He's more interested in his hair and he's constantly a 'nearly' player.
