Cherries wilt in second half

Andrew Surman put his finger on the problem of the Cherries' second half performance in his post match interview "we stopped passing the ball in the second half". It is very unlike Bournemouth to stop doing what they do so well in the course of a match but the Millwall defeat highlighted that the team is still getting caught in the headlights at times when it forgets to keep pressing forward. 

Arter was unusually subbed in the Millwall match. 

Millwall did change their style and their formation. Ian Holloway openly acknowledged that the diamond shape that he used in the first half was not working well and injuries forced him to change things around anyway. Bringing on Ricardo Fuller gave Millwall much more opportunity to play the ball up to their experienced striker and to build attacks. The ball kept coming into AFCB's box and the Cherries sat deep in defence rather than working a way of keeping the ball on the deck and passing their way back into control. Credit to Millwall they put everything into that second half.

It is easy to know that things are not going well but quite another to change things positively when what was going so well suddenly seems ineffective. Eddie Howe tried to relieve pressure by taking off Harry Arter and bringing on Eunan O'Kane's fresh legs in midfield but it was a move that perhaps encouraged the team to sit back more and  Millwall just cranked up the high balls even more.

It was clear to see AFCB were struggling from about the hour mark, even though they were still two up at the time. The test is how they come back from this though as it was not a defeat and they did so many things perfectly well in the first half of the match.

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All Departments has also released a podcast on AFCb 2 v 2 Millwall so visit the All Departments' website to tune in or listen by scrolling down to the All Department's sound bar on the right side panel of Cherry Chimes and just click to listen.