Frampton (I think it was pretty obvious which centre back I meant - the one currently playing in midfield)
I'd definitely class centre mid as one of Jackmans positions, albeit he has a few positions. Maybe I should have worded it as "one of his positions" but from memory he played centre mid a fair bit last year as well as left mid (which we never really filled properly with Whelpdale, Rooney, Jackman and Obita all having a go). He's certainly played there enough in his career to make a more credible argument that he's a centre midfield player than you can make of Frampton, who incidently looked like he was popping up at left mid by the GRS a bit anyway on Saturday when Whelpdale went right and Allen central for the 5-10 minutes before he went off.
Anyway throwoff- my point in my original post is not that people are surprised that a non playing player has gone, as you suggested, but that it was a surprise that he hasn't played much this season.
I'm not saying he would've been in my strongest 11 or is the answer to all our prayers, but I would pick him over Frampton in centre mid if given the choice, and would have rotated him into the team more than he has been. I also think he would have fitted into the left of the 4132 we were playing earlier in the season pretty well as it would have allowed him to play narrower than a lm in a 442, get on the ball and pass it, but with adequate cover from the centre midfield to prevent his size being exposed. Just feel it's a shame that a decent squad player more often than not failed to make the bench