Monday 7 March 2016

11 points clear for AFCB - what more could we ask for?

I expect most AFCB fans are enjoying looking at the league table. It may not yet be that the side is  safe, but the Cherries are playing with confidence while picking up points. The table will look after itself while AFCB continue to go after teams and remain as solid as they have been at the back.

The problem Eddie Howe now has is a nice one. He has to try and keep the players motivated and put pressure on them to keep their place in the side. It is perhaps why he has not set the team a points total or at least not in publicly. If that total was reached the team just may switch off and he, like all the supporters, wants AFCB to win as many games as they can.
AFCB are heading up the league.
If the Cherries can get a win against Swansea next weekend though I might not be alone in thinking that AFCB will be approaching the point in the season when they are not looking over their shoulder anymore. Hopefully it will be the first season in a long time when we are not all biting our nails for one reason or another over the last five games. 

Premier League safety was the aim last August and after that it will probably be the aim to take the team's game to the next level. I already felt that the team was playing with more freedom up at Newcastle. Eddie Howe has the ideas and the coaching skills and the players are soaking up all those words of wisdom and transferring it to the pitch as well as they have done at anytime since Eddie has been back in charge. 

We don't yet know what the next stage of AFCB's development will mean in terms of play on the pitch, but it is likely that some more attention will have to be given to what the players do in keeping the goal count against down. The challenge will be to do that without taking away from the attacking side of the team's play. I am looking forward to seeing how Eddie goes about that so that AFCB can go into games against the top teams knowing that a good performance will return them points. There are some good testers to come in that respect with home games against the likes of Man City, Liverpool and Chelsea still to come.

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