I have mixed feelings on this.
Dunne has been here so long and the money, and therefore players, available to the club has changed so much in that time that there was always going to come a time where his place in the team was under threat and even his place at the club.
So, everyone knew that he would have to face up to and beat a massive challenge to still be part of this team in a couple of years time.
There were always going to be players coming in that would possibly be of a far higher standard. As good as Dunnie was for us I don't think even his biggest fan would say he was at the very top end of the scale of world centre backs.
Saying that, I'm not convinced that there is a huge amount of difference between him and Lescott. People seem to want to believe that the first dodgy season that Dunne has had in five years is indicative of him now being shit.
Lescott, imo, has loads to prove, is massively over rated in the press (never mind his price tag) and has become a bit of a media darling over the past few years. Yet, again imo, he has looked as far away from the likes of Ferdinand as Dunne has. Therefore, I don't think it is a shoe in at all that he will prove a massive improvement on Dunne. The price tag was the biggest joke in football transfer history but I guess that doesn't matter anymore. But time will tell how it goes. There's no reason he can't be a success.
The other side of this though is that - again - we see a lot of people desperate to belittle and almost vilify another player who was here pre takeover, call him shite and drag down his reputation now he is out of the door.
The amount of people calling he a dodgy player, not good enough, rubbish, snide, etc, is staggering. And it's not the first time. When it looked like Petrov was going there were dozens on here desperate to say how they always knew he was a tosser, a moaner and how he is shit now anyway. That seems the way of things with a lot of City fans at the moment. Service and ability count for little. Everyone who leaves is shit and bitter and everyone who arrives is miles better than them.
Of course, some arriving are miles better than some who have left but the disrespect shown to the likes of Dunne and Petrov, who have played out of their skin at times in the Premier League for City and are certainly nowhere near the end of their top flight career is most disturbing imo.
And, add to that, this sort of interview with Dunne, where another person who was here before the current management team is left feeling bitter and resentful about how they have been treated, is too much of a regular occurance for me to think it is not indicitive of something.
Richard Dunne and Joe Hart are not the sort to moan over nothing. Add in all the rumours last season, Cassell and his staff moving out, the belief that many have that Hughes acts like some sort of distant, aloof figure, the stories leaked to the press last year slagging the attitude of everyone who wasn't new and claiming the club was a joke, the almost manic like behaviour shown by the management to get their own Tafia running every area of the club and ship out virtually everyone who was here before last Sept, as if that makes them automatically a rubbish player/coach/administrator/whatever and it leaves just adds to the bad taste I have around the suspiscion that man management, the ability to do things the right way and the skill of being able to work with people who aren't your own cronies may be severely lacking in the City management at present.
Some will think that was the whole point of my post.
Maybe it was, I don't know. It's the first thing that struck me when I read that someone else thinks they have been treated roughly by a club in a position to be able not to do so and go about things the right way.
Anyway, I've no gripe with the onfield aspect this season, so my position is a lot different to how it was last season. That doesn't mean that I'm going to be happy that yet another "City's management shit on people" story is added to the weight of the other stories and rumours that have done the rounds since last year.
