Yeah I do get that. It probably started 18months ago when we may have tried to start talking contracts. Whilst he was probably the injured at the time, I don’t blame a striker who was once completely uncontested as Kane’s backup (and did well when he got the chance) for not signing for us when we looked certain at some point to finally go down over the coming seasons, and with 777 seemingly our only saviours.
It’s ultra frustrating how little he has managed to contribute. But thinking calmly, I don’t believe he has done much wrong. I think he has always tried, I’m positive he will have done everything to try and improve his obvious weaknesses, he’s allowed some managers to throw him back into the squad when clearly not ready. I can’t hate a player what they aren’t good at. That’s really weird.
I thought Dyche looked to have done a brave and sensible job in how he just took him completely out of the picture to try and sort his injury. Maybe Dyche also saw the other difficulties and tried to give space for that too, which he will never get credit for, but if so, should be commended.
With hindsight on Doms career and the type of player he is, it’s crying out for 2 years vying for promotion in the Championship in his early 20’s, scoring 20+ goals a season, gaining both skills and confidence. And seeing if his body can cope with all those games, and if so, conditioning further. Instead he had the PL survival of one of the most storied, and skint, clubs in the game on his shoulders the moment we left him as our only striker and though we’d spread the goals around.
Club more at fault than the player, coupled with some ridiculous bad luck.