When West Ham United sold Portuguese ‘wonderkid’ Domingos Quina to Watford in the summer it raised a few eyebrows.
Diminutive Quina came with a big reputation when he was snapped up by West Ham after previous spells in the youth academies at both Benfica and Chelsea.
Footage from development team matches often backed up the ‘wonderkid’ tag attributed to the youngster.
Goals from long range and audacious skill were Quina’s trademark.
He found his way into the West Ham first team squad on occasion under both Slaven Bilic and David Moyes.
But the 19-year-old failed to impress when the chance came.
From Barca to Watford in one summer
Quina was linked with Barcelona in the summer (Sky Sports) before ending up at Vicarage Road in a deadline day deal worth just £1 million.
That shocked Hammers fans who felt it was typical of their club not to demand a decent transfer fee.
Quina scored a superb long range goal on his debut for Watford against Reading in the league cup.
But his only two appearances for the Hornets so far have come in the league cup, missing a penalty in a shootout defeat to Spurs in the next round.
Quina is yet to be included in a Premier League squad for Watford suggesting Javi Gracia is also unconvinced.
Now West Ham fans are seeing exactly why the club were prepared to let Quina go without much of a fight after the emergence of Grady Diangana.
Diangana thriving in West Ham first team
The 20-year-old Academy star has been thrown into first team action after impressing Manuel Pellegrini in training.
The Chilean has compared Diangana to brilliant former Arsenal star Santi Carzola, who he had at Villareal and Malaga (whufc.com).
It is some compliment.
And Diangana has been doing his best to live up to it.
Quina still not ready
A a string of superb performances started with a brace in an 8-0 cup win over Macclesfield.
When Andriy Yarmolenko was ruled out for the rest of the season with an Achilles injury, Diangana had done enough to be given the chance to take his place.
He has been a breath of fresh air for the Hammers ever since, culminating in his first assist in the 4-2 win over Burnley last time out.
On this form Diangana looks infinitely better prepared for the rigours of Premier League football than Quina.
The flying winger has bags of pace, skill, character and a superb attitude and workrate to go with it.