Written by AFCB_Liam
– First half was ok but unspectacular from us and we gave a couple of big chances away. Former Cherries and now Nottingham Forest striker Sam Surridge should have scored and should have had a penalty. As AFC Bournemouth head coach Scott Parker said, we were too open. For all the criticism of Parkerball, against teams like Forest, in it’s truest sense (control of possession with pressing from the front) it absolutely works.
– 2nd half we controlled it from start to finish. Absolutely superb. Parker clearly had a word and set things right. Our passing was crisper, more pressure from the front and never gave them a second on the ball. Forest couldn’t handle us, they looked completely rattled and started to lose their heads a bit.
– The substitution of Kieffer Moore for Jefferson Lerma was an absolute sliding doors moment. The easy option was Ben Pearson. Fair play to Parker, he saw we were in the ascendancy and doubled down. Fortune favours the brave and that made all the difference.
– Lewis Cook Man of the Match for me – immense from start to finish.
– Lloyd Kelly not far behind – both him and Nat Phillips were excellent throughout and didn’t give them a sniff 2nd half.
– This team has its flaws, especially breaking down teams we should do and getting complacent. Turning it on when the pressure is on isn’t one of them, against Hudders, Coventry, Fulham and today we put in some of our best performances of the season.
– Apparently, the goal was not a training ground routine, in which case SO much respect to Philip Billing for that. Under pressure would have been easy to play the percentages. He has his critics but I thought Billing was excellent, especially in the 2nd half.
– Crowd were immense from the start. Couldn’t really hear much from the Forest fans on sky. Red Army, Red Flag, Super Scotty, Song for Nonny all heard loud and proud.
– Parker interview shows how much it means to him and how hard he works. The guy needs to enjoy it a little more! He might not be the most media-trained, but he is clearly dedicated to his job and he deserves another crack at the Premier League. No doubt there’s a massive job to prepare us for the top flight though.
– That said, we have the spine of a very good side here.
– David Brooks interview on Sky was the highlight of the evening. He will be a big part of our next PL adventure.
– We are back in the big time! Debates on how to spend it are for the summer. Forest have been trying to get there for 23 years. We should never take for granted just how lucky we are to be where we are (again!).
– That was for Nonny.
Man of the match against ForestBilling
L. Cook
Kelly
Moore
Anthony
Zemura
Christie
Phillips
Smith
Lerma
Travers
Solanke
Pearson
Mepham
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Your say…
simonhpieman said…
Never seen Phil Bill win so many headers!
Sky going on about the Surridge pen. Not a lot of contact, looked like he dragged his foot a bit? Maybe my rose tints.
The goal was outstanding, that sort of thing only ever seems to happen against us! Nice to see us score it.
Funny feeling going up again. Not as excited as before and I feel like we have a lot of work to do to be able to compete next season whereas before I knew we had the team, pace and ability to do well (don’t get me wrong, I’m delighted!). Stuttering, inconsistent season where we’ve seldom played to our potential and still finish second. Mad.
Well done to the players tonight, though. Great effort and great result. – Join the conversation, click here.
Written by Matt Stevenson
Here’s the xG timeline from Tuesday night, although it highlights limitations of the xG stat.
Despite being largely in complete control for the majority of the second half we didn’t actually create too many clear chances. In terms of chances above 1 in 8, there were three, all to Forest. Moore’s goal was rated harder than I thought it was (1 in 16) my only possible explanation is that normally the keeper would have expected a shot and been set and ready to make a save, whereas Forest were caught off guard.
The first big chance was when Surridge hit the bar in the 9th minute. The next was in the 78th minute when the ball found Yates unchallenged near the penalty spot, but he couldn’t sort his feet out in time (about 1 in 2).
In the 83rd minute, came the winner, superb deception from Billing who found Moore, who bent it into the far corner. The final chance came in the 99th minute with their keeper flicking one on at the near post, but the xG wouldn’t have factored in the fact he was facing in the wrong direction.
But who cares – we won!
