OK here's the thing...
We needed a defender to play in a back three. Now it seems we've signed one.
But everything about this seems average.
He's hardly a world class defender, never set his old club alight with amazing games. He's had a decent world cup but then again so did half of the Algeria national team.
It's like we've gone "Right, who's available... £16m? Good price. We'll have him."
We've paid average money for an average player, when now more than ever we need quality and in order to get that we need to spend big money.
He may turn out to be great. But he has an equal chance of being absolute crap at the level we need him to be at.
We simply don't have time to get the signings wrong right now. This one reeks of desperation.