First goal nightmare for Lerma

The match against Newcastle couldn't have got off to a much worse start than it did. I have felt at various points during the season that Bournemouth have been slow to learn from kicking long at goal kicks, when they can easily clear danger. Playing from the back patiently is okay when the players are confident, but at the moment it is a complication and if Ramsdale had kicked long rather than pass out to Billing, the Cherries wouldn't have conceded that early goal.

Lerma has a bad day at the office.

Instead the ball found its way out to Lerma and under pressure he slipped and lost possession. I don't feel that Lerma was the real culprit, it was the way Bournemouth chose to play that created the goal for Newcastle. They didn't minimise the risk and they gambled badly. Keeping a clean sheet had to be a priority, but gifting a goal set the momentum for Newcastle to rack up the big score.

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It was like the Crystal Palace game all over again. The players haven't moved on from that and crumbled again. The team has to take collective responsibility and at the moment you can only see individuals when you look at performances. The team is simply not functioning as a collective unit. Playing in an empty stadium is something that Eddie feels the players are finding extremely difficult, but if our players can't do it then here is little hope of staying up.

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The players need to accept that they are not going to score first in every game. They have only scored one goal in three games now, and at the moment having possession seems to be a problem for the players. The slow build ups and inability to play the ball forward has been more and more noticeable. The players have to get over this because they won't win a game before they do. At the moment the games are going to come very fast and it is going to be hard to pick the players up in time.

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Lerma's nightmare is symptomatic of a lot of things are happening to AFCB. You can call it bad luck, but I'd say it is more that the players can't see how they can get out of their predicament. It is pretty sad to witness. Good players that can't do the basics always looks depressing. The time is up for coming good and realisation could well be hitting the players that they are not as good as they thought they are.

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