OPINION
Laurens De Bock is going to go down as one of the most pointless signings that Leeds United have made and his recent loan spell in Belgium is proving that he is nowhere near the quality that is required at Elland Road.
In January, the Whites had a severe problem at left-back and that led to the club wasting a reported £1.5million [Yorkshire Evening Post] on buying De Bock, 25, from Club Brugge.
The Belgian left-back went on to make seven first team appearances for United in the second-half of last season, and gave the fans a performance they will never forget in a 2-2 draw at Derby County – for all the wrong reasons.
Leeds were terrible last season and De Bock definitely won the award for the worst solo performance of the campaign in the draw at Pride Park as he constantly gave away the ball, caused a mix-up with Liam Cooper which led to Derby scoring and regularly losing his man when the home side were attacking.
In the summer, director of football Victor Orta sent De Bock back to Belgium on loan to KV Oostende, a team that finished 11th last season as the left-back’s old side Club Brugge won the Jupiler League title.
Since returning to his home nation, De Bock has really struggled for game-time with just two appearances across all competitions.
Oostende failed to win in both of his outings and since those couple of games, the Leeds loanee has been omitted completely from the matchday squad or remained an unused substitute.
It is becoming pretty clear that Andrea Radrizzani threw £1.5million down the drain when he signed De Bock earlier this year and the chances of him seeing that cash again are zero to none.
No one in their right minds would repay the Whites that cash for someone who is clearly struggling to play for an average Belgian top-flight side and with the 25-year-old still having over three years left on his contract, it could be a while before he is offloaded for good.