He could have been free to go anywhere he liked this summer but signed an extension last year instead. Probably knew he'd get nowhere near £40-50k elsewhere.
So neither of us know the actual circumstances there. But I think it seems pretty obvious that he was told if he wants to go out on loan (in order to play for a non-shit club) then he'd have to sign an extension so we could get some money for him this summer. Either way it doesn't justify this shit, we wanted to extend his contract, he extended it. I doubt he was told he'd be rotting in the reserves.
I dare say that was with the intention of getting a small fee for him this summer but that didn't work out