I wonder how much this 'suspect temperament' is a placebo affect. Not saying he leads by example but, other than losing his cool v Barca as well as his career defining inconsistency, I'm struggling to think what he's actually done at our club to earn the label of someone with a suspect temperament.
I know he's not particularly well liked in France but I highly suspect that's more to do with institutional racism due to his Algerian background. Don't think I'm joking, the levels of hatred towards immigrants in France is astonishing.
He's had his "please STFU" moments throughout his career but that seem to have stopped since joining us. Anybody agree? Also he looked like he was having a decent conversation with Lescott at full time against West Brom showing that he can't be as unpopular as people make out.
On top of that he offers something different to Sterling, Navas, KDB and Roberts in that it's just impossible to take the ball off him and he can slow the tempo down for us when we need to. I also think that Navas gets far, far too much stick considering he was a relatively inexpensive way of bringing in an alternate way of opening opposition up. However, if one of those players was to leave to make room for youth or a new signing, I'd prefer it to be Navas because we will miss Nasri's much derided inderectness as an option throughout the season.