The Cherries on top: Episode 36 – Say we are Premier League
Season 4
We made it. The Premier League.
With consecutive promotions the rise had been quick and I’ve tried to assemble some of Championship Manager’s finest. An unlikely cup win and a string of last-gasp victories have all led to reaching the pinnacle of English football for the first time in the clubs 129 year history.
It would take until the 2015–16 season before Bournemouth would cement their place in the Premier League. This would be after the club went into administration in 2008.
As with most seasons after promotion, the board expect us to again battle bravely against relegation. This time they might have a point, I think that a top half of the table would be a decent finish. A European spot would be dreamland! A league win? Surely not.
Our opening fixtures are Man City (away), Wolves (home) and Fulham (away). Not a bad set of fixtures for our first season in the top tier.
With the start of the season upon us we still have plenty of transfer activity. After only 1 season in English football, Bobby Carlos goes back to Real Madrid.
Despite getting hammered 5–2 in the charity shield, Newcastle dig into their deep pockets and splash out on Stephen Hughes for £10.75 million taking their summer spending to £23 million (following on from £66 million last season)
Hopefully we’ve done good enough business to compete. With the three friendlies under our belt I feel that this will settle the new signings – I think the game probably doesn’t care, but I feel better anyway.
Another youth prospect comes through the door, Pete isn’t going to get a contract but I'd expect Spiderman to have better jumping personally.
In terms of preparation, we follow the same pattern as last season. Another defender is side-lined for 3 months, this time it’s Gunnarson. He tears his calf in training on the eve of our first game of the season which is Manchester City.
City dismissed Trevor Francis towards the end of last season, replacing him with the then QPR manager Ian Holloway who narrowly avoided relegation last season.
Here is the squad for our first game of Premier League football. Ravneng would have been right back but picked up a knock in training. 5 new signings make their debuts with another 4 on the bench. My very own SAS start up front.
We get off to a great start. Mark Kerr scores our first goal in the Premier League inside the first ten minutes. We continue to be on top after the goal. Skalidis caps off a great half with a goal on his Premier League debut.
The home side come on the offensive and having never played a single game for City in real life, Matias Vuoso pulls one back early in second period.
Selakovic’s debut goal restores the 2 goal advantage for us with 20 minutes left. Despite not getting on the scoresheet. Cherno Samba picks up man of the match with 2 assists as we have our first win under our belts!
Despite being a Premier League side we have to take part in the 2nd round of the League Cup. We draw Leicester away so not the easiest of fixtures, but one we should win.
Our first home fixture is against Wolves. They play a rather odd 4–1–2–1–2 formation and are in a position to bench Jay-Jay Okocha and Tim Cahill.
As it’s a midweek fixture, Moukoko and Cherno are not 100% so Barsom comes in and Luca Toni is upfront for his Bournemouth debut.
An even first half has the visitors hitting the crossbar, we have some good periods of play as Skalidis has the best of our chances. Towards the end of the half Oakes is busier of the two keepers.
Toni scores a goal on his debut after knocking in a rebound early in the second half. We are on top in the second half as the away side only have a few attempts on target. Toni almost scores from another rebound but Oakes is able to keep him out.
Our first home game in the division is a win. No surprises that it sets an attendance record (14,991), a record which I expect to broken a few times this season.
Our final game of the month is against Fulham at Craven Cottage, they are a very attacking team but we start very brightly. Samba scores inside 10 minutes with his first goal for The Cherries.
Fulham come back strong, Boa Morte goes close and Facundo Sava tests David Dei. We almost finish the half 2–0 up as Hadzi scores but the linesman has other ideas. We ride our luck at the start of the second half, Sava is denied twice in successive attacks. Against the run of play, Skalidis slots home unmarked to give us a two goal lead with 20 minutes to go.
With 10 minutes to we start to fall apart. Summer signing Anders Svensson scores his first Fulham goal on his debut and then 3 minutes later Sava levels the game up. Shit.
Alain Goma goes close from a corner, but it’s Mark Kerr who deals the killer blow. Scoring from 25 yards to win the game in the 88th minute!
Now, we’ve only played 3 games so the table means nothing at this stage but I couldn’t have asked for a better start. A 100% record, the strangest thing is that it is enough for us to sit at the top of the league!
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