The Cherries win at Brighton was masterful

The manner of the Cherries win at Brighton should fill the manager and the supporters with great belief. Okay, so it wasn't the most fluent of performances and Brighton closed down well and fought extremely hard to stop the Cherries getting into full stride. But three points is all that are important in these games and the pressure will be mounting on Norwich City, Watford and Middlesbrough ahead of their games now as they know they have to get results to keep up with this AFCB side that is starting to ask questions of them.

Tommy could be really pleased with his work at Brighton.

The Cherries entered the game on the back of conceding goals in their previous two matches and although they are now on an unbeaten run of nine games that extend back to 25 February 2015, the team is under tremendous pressure now to keep winning. That is what makes the performance against Brighton such a terrific result. A point away in the Championship is difficult enough but to go to a team that seems to always save its best for the Cherries and to keep them out was very demanding on Elphick, Cook, Daniels and Francis in particular. The fact that Artur Boruc only faced one shot on target does not fully tell the whole story of how hard the defence worked, but it does indicate that they did things right and set the platform for the win.

Brighton had been on a bad run and coming back from a long trip up at Rotherham I always fancied them to tire a little in the second half. The fixture run-in for AFCB has been kind in that respect and the Cherries looked fresh and the impact players they now have on the bench are proving their value. For once the team and the fans can sit back and enjoy Saturday now and see how the chasers do. If the other teams all win though that should not lessen the importance of this victory though as many would have predicted that this was the game that was going to be the biggest test in these last few games. While there are still big matches to come, the boxes are all being ticked off one by one to see if this team is ready for the Premier League and from what I see it is A+ stars all the way at the moment. 

I am due to have a chat with Michael Dunne on his All Departments' podcast later tonight when we go over the events of the last 24 hours, this weekend's results and perhaps look forward to Tuesday's fixture against Reading. Make sure you join us when the podcast is released - I'll announce it on Cherry chimes when Michael posts it.

Photographs of last night's match are now up on Match Day Gallery.