Gardening and a kill or cure action

This is the acer in our side garden which I bought to replace our old one. The old one (which I meant to take a photo of and forgot) we'd had many years in a large pot in the back garden but suddenly it was in a bad way with white spots on it and dying. I treated it for bugs and it was dying faster so I treated it for fungus and it looked to have died soon after.
I inspected it and thought action kill or cure so i removed it from the pot, hacked it back to one stem which meant having to replant it at an angle in order for it to grow straight if it came back from the dead. 
It looked totally lifeless so I bought the one above and of course the old one survived and now looks absolutely great a couple of years on. 
The old one is in a pot in our front garden but I think I should probably plant it before too long.
I will try to remember to take a photo of the original one tomorrow!
Feeling disappointed that a bit of weeding in the garden caused me a lot of back and hip pain - I won't give in though, just have to do shorter spans more often.