AFCB will be fit and ready for the Premier League

The stopwatch is out and the heart monitor is on. The players will have found it tough going in their first week back in training with the temperature rising and lots of work to do. That's the way that Eddie Howe, Jason Tindall and Simon Weatherstone certainly like it by the look of the pictures taken of the players in their new training kits last week as the real work gets underway. It looks like there was a fair bit of fun as well though as piggybacks seemed to be much in evidence. 

Everyone wants to be in tip-top condition for the start of the new season.

I thought that last season the Cherries were one of the fittest teams and usually had very strong second halves, when it hadn't always gone so well in the first 45 minutes. Whether the Premier League requires more variety of training than the team had in the Championship is a question that Dan Hodges, head of sports science, will have worked out and the coaches will be looking to add even more control and precision to the team's play.

There are quite a few new faces of course and perhaps Sylvain Distin has been lucky to miss out on a few days early training with the others. I was perhaps more wandering if there were some extra absentees and while Harry Arter will hopefully have his feet up, it wasn't evident that there were any omissions. I'm sure we will be updated soon if there are any injuries.

What I also noticed was that the ball was straight out of the bag, so the players can at least enjoy the feel and touch of the football again and not have to do massive long runs all the time. Making the players reach their peak on 8 August will be the aim and in the meantime the players themselves have to try and get in the manager's thoughts for as many games as they can before the season kicks off.

I don't relish the players the work that they now need to do, but I know that they'll all be giving 100 per cent and it will be a pleasure for fans to see them in the pre-season friendlies.