Steve Cook can lead defenders to clean sheet against Brighton

One almost ever-present player in AFCB's defence is Steve Cook. He may have to defer the captain's role to Andrew Surman against Brighton, but the senior defender will be more excited than most Bournemouth players to get the clean sheet against his former team.

Steve Cook will want to get his way against former club Brighton & Hove Albion

Steve has been playing more and more towards the right side of the defence which is perhaps not his strongest side of the field. It may be one of the reasons why it takes him a few passes to get his direction correct on some of his distribution in games of late, but he always gives 100 per cent and is now fully used to the pressures of the Premier League.

There is a little more competition for Steve Cook now that Tyrone Mings is getting back to full fitness and Jack Simpson has finally had a 90 minute game, but it is most likely that Steve and Nathan Aké will resume their partnership at the back for the visit of Brighton. With Nathan Aké's recent adventure in central midfield though, it is possible that Howe could keep him there and bring Tyrone Mings into the defence.

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The rotation of players is now at its height with the busy period, and it would be wise for Howe to have the central spine of his team remain as unchanged as he can. Steve Cook is one of those blocks that he won't want to change and against Brighton we can expect Steve to be in the thick of things trying to organise the players around him not to concede. 

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Send in your score predictions for AFCB v Brighton to @CherryChimes before 9am on Saturday. We will pick a winner from the correct score predictions to win a Cherry Chimes T-shirt.

Cherry Chimes talks to We are Brighton