It wasn't long after the 5-2 home win against Olympic Marseilles that the papers were full of the news that Jefferson Lerma was about to sign for AFCB with Levante having agreed a fee of £25m for the player. It has been an awkward summer with the Cherries finding Levante reluctant to sell and the World Cup and the shorter window have put immense pressure on the club to get this deal over the line. But now that it is done are AFCB going to reap the benefits straight away?
Jefferson has been at a World Cup and will have been keeping fit in pre-season with Levante, even if he might not have been the focus of too many games for Levante this summer. He won't be prepped on every aspect of AFCB's play and is unlikely to feature straight away, even if Howe will be keen to get him started as soon as he feels he can trust Lerma to be an asset that he can use. I'm hoping that the arrival of Lerma gives the Cherries more of a ball-inning edge to their midfield and enables Lewis Cook to be released more to do his work higher up the field.
The importance of the signing is evident if you consider that Bournemouth didn't have any players at this year's World Cup playing games. Lerma is an intelligent player that could be the start of a new Bournemouth side that is going to challenge further up the league. Before this deal was done I believed that AFCB would be fighting near the wrong end of the table, but all the players in the squad will know that Lerma has been brought in to help them. That will breath confidence and expectations and AFCB can go into games knowing they have a club behind them that has invested in the squad to try and give them the best chance of competing against the best. The club has now broken its record signing amount for the last three years and Bournemouth are having to do that to keep pace with the league they are in.
While AFCB will be annoyed that things could not have been completed sooner, they've got their main target and will look to move forward now having gained even more experience in the transfer market.
In other new, Bournemouth now wait to see what offers come in for Harry Arter with Cardiff City, AFCB's first opponents among the interested clubs.
Meanwhile, AFCB winger Connor Mahoney signed a season-long loan for Birmingham City yesterday.
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| Jefferson Lerma's long transfer saga is finally settled. |
The importance of the signing is evident if you consider that Bournemouth didn't have any players at this year's World Cup playing games. Lerma is an intelligent player that could be the start of a new Bournemouth side that is going to challenge further up the league. Before this deal was done I believed that AFCB would be fighting near the wrong end of the table, but all the players in the squad will know that Lerma has been brought in to help them. That will breath confidence and expectations and AFCB can go into games knowing they have a club behind them that has invested in the squad to try and give them the best chance of competing against the best. The club has now broken its record signing amount for the last three years and Bournemouth are having to do that to keep pace with the league they are in.
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In other new, Bournemouth now wait to see what offers come in for Harry Arter with Cardiff City, AFCB's first opponents among the interested clubs.
Meanwhile, AFCB winger Connor Mahoney signed a season-long loan for Birmingham City yesterday.
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