Bournemouth Match Report

Cherry’s Pip At The Last
Well I said it. I said that ridiculous Post piece could haunt us. And it truly did. I hope the author, the now infamous True Red and the Post can look at themselves for knowing that did play a part in rallying the Bournemouth fans and players into performing. They have admitted as much in a piece in Bournemouths local paper. I know one person was protesting (a little too) loudly that it was a joke, but even so, it gave Bournemouth a focus.

My friend turned to me during the game and said we’re going to be punished for these missed chances and truly we were. Although some have suggested the ref was bad, any decision he made didn’t truely affect the game for me, but merely added to frustrations of the fans at our incompetence in front of goal.

The match stats speak loudly. We had 21 shots to their 14, but had the same amount on target. We had the lionshare of possession. But the one stat that matters is that bounrmeouth “lowly little Bournemouth” left the City Ground with a point.
To be fair Bourneouth looked very good on the attack, hitting the post in the first half. I was extremely worried when Pugh and Pittman lined up a free kick, thinking yes they are going to score. When the Cherries did equalise I wasn’t as much shock and surprised as just frustrated that we had failed to kill them off.

This said I whole heartedly agree with the sentiments of Colin Fray post match when asked about the mis firing striker.s He said that two weeks ago no-one was suggested the team lacked firepower when Henderson had scored in a few games succession. As usual with the fans the last result is the only in mind, and we forget he bigger picture, you just see we toiled in that game and so we need new players.

I felt a little sorry for Cox, he was obviously trying, and looked exhausted when took off. He was taking shots when passes wre better because hes desperate to score and desperate to be that man we turn to for goals. But Saturday, and a lot of the last 6 months it just wasn’t his day.

Bournemouths offside trap worked wonders. It frustrated Henderson and Cox. Constantly catching us offside, again returning to the views of my friend, he was watching Cox at one stage when we had possession deeper and noticed for around 10-12 seconds Cox remained in an offside position had the ball been played long to him. I’m all for playing on the shoulder, and using that, but remaining offside and trying to step back at the last minute to be onside just sn’t effective for me.

Not with the high line Bournemouth put out, obviously looking at how we play, with
teams usually standing a bit deeper at the City Ground, allowing those balls to be played, they riskily wielded a high line that stopped us. I have no idea if this is their normal game.

To be honest had they not scored that late goal this debate wouldn't exist. We'd be talking about a professional win with a glorious goal by Lansbury. Instead we focus as always with Forest on the negatives. And yes thats what sticks in the mind, but at the end of the day had we held on 90% of peoples moaning and perception of this game would change.

Is the Post to blame? They didn't help, but at the end of the day they weren't missing the chances. It contributed in a sense that it focussed Bournemouths mind pre game. It enthused their fans. It's been pointed out since the game by penty that it was a rallying cry. But that said, had we been able to finish it'd be completely irrelevant. Whats to blame is a collective failing to score enough goals. But move on, these games happen and theres no need to beat ourselves up as much as some fans have been

The Ever Increasing Dumbing Down of the Post

I genuinely had to cringe today at an article that the Post put out on its website and one assumes in Print too. And increasingly so these days. Badly thought out, hobbled together and just completely ridiculously written. And worse of all I have to thank a Bournemouth fan for pointing it out to me, because it shows us in a bad light against our next opponents.

The article, admittedly not an actual journalistic one, but one of the ever increasing ly used Post bloggers, basically all but suggested Saturday is a foregone conclusion, Bournemouth are basically a pub team showing up to be beaten at a glorious magnificent stadium that will make their lowly fans cower in disbelief at the history.

It’s the kind of opinion pieces that make me cringe.

Yes we have had a wonderful history. Yes Bournemouth don’t, and yes they have smaller attendance figures than us. But to basically point out that this is as good as it gets its horrendously arrogant and utterly obnoxious.

Bournemouth has earned their chance to be in the Championship. They started the season as equals and in Eddie Howe have a good young manager. That piece suggested that seemed to be holding Burnley back. Bournemouth are on the rise.

This small time Bournemouth are in 8th place 6 points behind the Reds. Not a horrendous place to be. The making out that Howe is a failed Burnley manager though not entirely incorrect isn’t really looking at facts. Howe left there a year ago. It’s not like they immediately became world beaters after he left. He took over the Cherries after they finished mid table, and took them up. He knows what he’s doing.

Then there’s the embarrassing part where their history is described as basically being all about Harry Redknapp and that’s it. Ok, so he played a huge part and their famous victory over Manchester United, and is the reason most people will have heard of the club, but it completely smacked of someone knowing this fact about Bournemouth and completely padding a childish piece of writing about the club. The attendance thing also negates Bournemouth is a smaller town than Nottingham.

What the hell the Post think they are doing these days make me wonder. I get in this day of cost cutting that this will be seen as a cheap way to expand their product. Using bloggers to write pieces means less journalists on a retainer, the fans think they have an input and its encourages people to read as they might get published. Overall cheaper and clearly must have felt a great idea to the new operators. But just putting out any old thing that appears in their submitted list isn’t going to make people read what was once a revered source of news and debate.

This will sound somewhat bizarre from a fellow blogger though. I don’t want the Post to have that service. It’s a newspaper and its website. You expect or at least would like journalists with journalistic integrity. Ex player pieces though widely criticised at least offer a different insight. This felt more like a drawn out Facebook status that seemed like a good idea at the time. If the writer is older than 20 I’ll be amazed.

I don’t like arrogance in football fans. The idea we shouldn’t even bother having to face you, and that’s a mere triviality is silly. That isn’t what makes football, football. Anyone on any day can and does beat their opponent.

I just wish that the Post would at least consider filtering some of the more dross pieces submitted to it. Maybe it’s that bad writing that is stopping people buying their paper. It’s a new site. Not a trumped up blog site. It hardly makes you think Forest have made a bad decision by shunning the paper if it employs such cheap shoddy ways of adding content. Leave the badly written blogs to us, and stick to actual trained Journalism please.