And here we all are once again, the beginning of the football season; 10 months of spending our Saturday's often in towns across the country watching a bunch men kick a ball around. However this year, for Bournemouth fans at least, will be different. We will all be watching our team in uncharted territory: The Championship. To begin life in the second tier of English football, The Cherries will begin the season against Charlton Athletic for the third time in four years. Charlton finished champions of League One in the 2011/12 season with an impressive 101 points and finished 9th last year in The Championship, meaning this is no easy match for Eddie Howe's men. The past four times the teams have met have resulted in 3 victories for Charlton and one draw- so Bournemouth definitely have a point to prove this Saturday.
It's safe to say Eddie Howe has plenty to be concerned about ahead on the dawn of the new season. Bournemouth have suffered numerous injuries in pre-season, with star players Matt Ritchie and Brett Pitman the notable concerns for Howe's men. Although The Cherries boast a few quality replacements for Ritchie in Ryan Fraser and Mohamed Coulibaly, no Pitman would leave the home team worryingly toothless up front. While when on form Lewis Grabban and Wes Thomas are dangerous players, both have been firing blanks for a significant amount of time. New signing Mohamed Coulibaly is versatile and has been excellent in pre-season, meaning he could fill Pitman's void should it be needed, but it seems wide or attacking midfield is his natural position. Arguably, Howe's biggest decision will be which defenders he chooses for the starting line-up. Should he opt for his usual 4-4-2 formation, only two out of Cook, Elphick and Ward will start, but he could also choose to begin with 5 at the back, a formation that has been seen in pre-season. Howe has to decide whether to opt for the pairing that led us to promotion, or to choose new signing Ward. While winning this match will not decide the fate of our season, getting off to a good start could be invaluable by the time May comes.
To me, Charlton are somewhat of an unknown quantity. I last saw them when they beat us 3-0 in August 2011, meaning it has been two years since I`ve seen them play. I`ve no doubt though that their squad has changed over that time, due to their promotion to The Championship. However, The Addicks are still managed by Chris Powell, who has had an extremely impressive stint as manager at The Valley.The Addicks also boast two former Bournemouth players in Rhoys Wiggins and Danny Hollands, who both left for the south coast for London after the 2010/11 season.
To help us gain some insight to our opponents on Saturday, three Charlton fans- Dan Fincy (@MiniFinchy), Scott Wilkes (@TheAddick95) and James Vogle (james_vogle) were kind enough to answer some questions for me.
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| Charlton were Champions in 2011 |
It's safe to say Eddie Howe has plenty to be concerned about ahead on the dawn of the new season. Bournemouth have suffered numerous injuries in pre-season, with star players Matt Ritchie and Brett Pitman the notable concerns for Howe's men. Although The Cherries boast a few quality replacements for Ritchie in Ryan Fraser and Mohamed Coulibaly, no Pitman would leave the home team worryingly toothless up front. While when on form Lewis Grabban and Wes Thomas are dangerous players, both have been firing blanks for a significant amount of time. New signing Mohamed Coulibaly is versatile and has been excellent in pre-season, meaning he could fill Pitman's void should it be needed, but it seems wide or attacking midfield is his natural position. Arguably, Howe's biggest decision will be which defenders he chooses for the starting line-up. Should he opt for his usual 4-4-2 formation, only two out of Cook, Elphick and Ward will start, but he could also choose to begin with 5 at the back, a formation that has been seen in pre-season. Howe has to decide whether to opt for the pairing that led us to promotion, or to choose new signing Ward. While winning this match will not decide the fate of our season, getting off to a good start could be invaluable by the time May comes.
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| Could Coulibaly be the difference maker on Saturday? |
To me, Charlton are somewhat of an unknown quantity. I last saw them when they beat us 3-0 in August 2011, meaning it has been two years since I`ve seen them play. I`ve no doubt though that their squad has changed over that time, due to their promotion to The Championship. However, The Addicks are still managed by Chris Powell, who has had an extremely impressive stint as manager at The Valley.The Addicks also boast two former Bournemouth players in Rhoys Wiggins and Danny Hollands, who both left for the south coast for London after the 2010/11 season.
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| Wiggins is sure to receive a hostile reception on his return |
To help us gain some insight to our opponents on Saturday, three Charlton fans- Dan Fincy (@MiniFinchy), Scott Wilkes (@TheAddick95) and James Vogle (james_vogle) were kind enough to answer some questions for me.
Charlton finished a very respectable 9th place last season, and were only 3 points off the play-offs. How did you view your first season back in the Championship?
DF: Our first season back was exceptional, very proud of how we did and if a few results went in our favour it might have not been Palace in the play-offs and it would have been us. I cant complain really we did very well and beat expectations which was very important for the fans and for the players we knew we had a good squad
SW: Incredible! Shaky start but had some great results (E.g. 5-4 win vs Cardiff and 6-0 win vs Barnsley) and finished the season the league's form team and only like 3 points from the top 6. We only spent 500k in the summer and finished a couple points off teams like Leicester and Bolton with virtually our league 1 team.
JV: Incredible! Shaky start but had some great results (E.g. 5-4 win vs Cardiff and 6-0 win vs Barnsley) and finished the season the league's form team and only like 3 points from the top 6. We only spent 500k in the summer and finished a couple points off teams like Leicester and Bolton with virtually our league 1 team.
DF: No Sadly not. I am on holiday but I would love to be going down, first game of the season are always brilliant and every club loves them. I am jealous of the fans going down! COYR!
SW: Wanted to, tickets sold out before I had a bit of cash on the hip. Went last time though when we won 1-0.
JV: Yes, I will be making the trip to the South Coast saturday, I missed out on it 2 seasons back due to me being on holiday, but I can not wait for it as we always seem to play a good game of football and I like Bournemouth, they are a nice club, I simply could not miss a season opener down the sea side! Come on you reds!
SW: Incredible! Shaky start but had some great results (E.g. 5-4 win vs Cardiff and 6-0 win vs Barnsley) and finished the season the league's form team and only like 3 points from the top 6. We only spent 500k in the summer and finished a couple points off teams like Leicester and Bolton with virtually our league 1 team.
Are you satisfied with the club's summer transfers?
DF: erm...in a bomb shell no. We only have 1 forward and only managed signings of Mark Gower and Richard Wood. Wood gives us a good back line again since we lost defender Taylor. Gower we had last year on loan and slotted in nicely so it was good to get him full time.
SW: What transfers? Only signed Mark Gower and Richard Wood, both on frees. The owners aren't giving Powell a penny to spend this summer which means we can't improve the squad and only have one senior striker. Starting the season without a no. 9 or 10.
JV: I am not satisfied at all with our summer transfers, releasing so many players which we could of got a decent amount of money for, releasing danny haynes was a big shame as it is not his fault however he is injury prone and a club like us with our financial stability he is not worth keeping especially as 'apparently' he was demanding higher wages. The best bit of our transfer activity this summer was us releasing Ricardo Fuller, scoring 5 goals in 31 games and hardly playing at all due to lack of fitness and injuries, with him being our highest earner aswell getting 20k a week I am glad to see the back of him! However he is now re-training with us which I do not think I have ever seen before. The worst worry for me is that we now only have one striker which is our fan favourite Yann Kermogant, as good as he is, when we played a 4-5-1 last season with Yann up top on his own just simply did not work, personally I do not think a 4-5-1 ever works due to the fact that the striker is always isolated. I think that if we get another striker who is proven to score a lot of goals then I will be happy.
JV: I am not satisfied at all with our summer transfers, releasing so many players which we could of got a decent amount of money for, releasing danny haynes was a big shame as it is not his fault however he is injury prone and a club like us with our financial stability he is not worth keeping especially as 'apparently' he was demanding higher wages. The best bit of our transfer activity this summer was us releasing Ricardo Fuller, scoring 5 goals in 31 games and hardly playing at all due to lack of fitness and injuries, with him being our highest earner aswell getting 20k a week I am glad to see the back of him! However he is now re-training with us which I do not think I have ever seen before. The worst worry for me is that we now only have one striker which is our fan favourite Yann Kermogant, as good as he is, when we played a 4-5-1 last season with Yann up top on his own just simply did not work, personally I do not think a 4-5-1 ever works due to the fact that the striker is always isolated. I think that if we get another striker who is proven to score a lot of goals then I will be happy.
Are there any specific players that Bournemouth fans should be worried about?
DF: We have a few Chris Solly our right back and Wiggins,ex Bournemouth, are both very dangerous going forward and like to create chances and are very quick. Yann Kermorgant too, he's big and and wins headers all the time.
SW: Chris Solly - Best RB in the football league
Rhoys Wiggins - Phenomenal going forward and will up his game when he's getting booed :-)
Johnnie Jackson - Captain, always likely to score
Bradley Pritchard - Never stops running, and finally adding goals to his game
Callum Harriott - Will destroy Francis (Who is the worst RB i've ever seen play for Charlton)
Yann Kermorgant - Already a Charlton legend, will win everything in the air no matter who' he's against. Warrior
Yann Kermorgant - Already a Charlton legend, will win everything in the air no matter who' he's against. Warrior
JV: You should be worried about our young tricky winger callum harriott, he came through the ranks at Charlton and has had a cracking pre season almost scoring in every game, bearing in mind he is only 19 and featured regularly towards the end of last season, a very exciting prospect for the future.
How are ex-Bournemouth players Danny Hollands and Rhoys Wiggins faring at Charlton?
DF: Danny Hollands had a great season in League One and played brilliantly all season but went out on loan last season to Swindon and didn't really feature last season at all. But in pre-season Hollands has been on fire for us and has scored 3 goals. Rhoys has been unbelievable when fit. He missed a big part of last season but when he was playing you knew he was there.
SW: Hollands was class in league 1 but couldn't adjust to the league last year so went out on loan, only a back up player now. Whereas Wiggins was class in league 1 and in the championship, had a couple injuries last year though. Probably our best LB since the legend Chris Powell.
JV: Rhoys Wiggins in my opinion is one of the best signings we made. Featuring every week and giving 100% every week, us as a club could not ask for any more, however he did miss quite a bit of last season due to a injury, but he came back more determined than ever and has come straight back in to the starting 11. Danny Hollands had a cracking first season for us being a key player in our promotion up to the championship, however last season he did not feature as he was not part of our plans due to other players playing better than him, although I do not think we gave him a big enough chance to prove himself at this level. He was loaned out to swindon playing 10 games and scoring 2 goals until it got ended shortly due to him getting injured and came back for treatment.
JV: Rhoys Wiggins in my opinion is one of the best signings we made. Featuring every week and giving 100% every week, us as a club could not ask for any more, however he did miss quite a bit of last season due to a injury, but he came back more determined than ever and has come straight back in to the starting 11. Danny Hollands had a cracking first season for us being a key player in our promotion up to the championship, however last season he did not feature as he was not part of our plans due to other players playing better than him, although I do not think we gave him a big enough chance to prove himself at this level. He was loaned out to swindon playing 10 games and scoring 2 goals until it got ended shortly due to him getting injured and came back for treatment.
Finally, will you be making the trip to the South Coast on Saturday?on Saturday
