AFC Bournemouth v Wolves

billythekid

billythekid

UTC Legend
A Welcome Back To Dean Court For Gary O’Neil

After the defeat against Everton at Goodison Park, it’s the worst start for a Cherries team since the first eight games 29 years ago in the 1994-95, Great Escape season. The first four league games ended in defeat and our club didn’t have a permanent manager, it was run by members of the team, which included John Williams (Willo). Mel Machin took over as our manager on the 1st September, the run of defeats continued for the next three games and in the eighth game our club drew with Chester City for our first point.

Our first game back after the international break is home at Dean Court on Saturday at 3 pm. It’s a game our team should be looking to get their first win and 3 points, which would double the season’s tally of 3 points from 8 games played so far. Our opponents are Wolves who under their new manager Gary O’Neil are 14th in the league table with 8 points.

Gary O’Neil will be pitting his wits against the man who replaced him at Dean Court, Andoni Iraola, it will be interesting to see who comes out on top. Gary should get a warm friendly reception from the Cherries fans, he went about his job with little complaint and kept our club in the top league.

Up until three days before the new season started, Wolves manager was Julen Lopetegui who had only been in the job for nine months after taking over in November with Wolves bottom of the Premier League after 15 games. He guided them to safety, with the club finishing in 13th place, two places and two points above AFCB. But he left the club by mutual agreement after not being happy with certain things at the club.

Gary O’Neil immediately stepped in as the new Wolves manager for the start of the new season. In his seventh game in the Premier League as Wolves manager, achieved what AFCB managers had tried but failed and that was to beat Manchester City. The Cherries had played City in 18 league games and 1 League Cup game, two league games ending in a draw.

Wolves on their away travels so far have beaten Everton 0-1, drawn with Luton Town 1-1. They have lost two, at Old Trafford 1-0 against Manchester United and 3-2 against Crystal Palace. At home they have won one and a big win as well against the reigning League Champions Manchester City by 1-0. Wolves have drawn one game against Aston Villa. They have been beaten by Brighton 1-3 and Liverpool 1-4.

The last time AFCB met Wolves at Dean Court was at the end of August last year and it was Gary O’Neils first game as our interim manager after the departure of Scott Parker, it ended 0-0 draw.

In our home games against Wolves, AFCB have W 2, D 3, L 1.
All competitions, AFCB have W 7, D 4, L 5.

AFCB Team News
The latest player on the injury list (7 players) is Philip Billing who picked up a knock during the Everton game and pulled out of the Denmark squad. Chris Mepham and Lloyd Kelly were both expected to be back after the international break. No news on players away on international duty.

AFCB Player To Watch
After being out with injury, Marcus Tavernier is hopefully with each game, getting back to form and against Everton had 7 dribbles, 5 more than any other player for either team. Up front, Dominic Solanke is due another goal.

Wolves Team News
In the Summer transfer window more players departed than were signed. On the injury front, Hugo Bueno has been out with a hamstring injury. Mario Lemina is suspended after picking up two yellow cards against Aston Villa. Jean-Ricner Bellergarde will be available again after completing his three match ban for getting sent off against Luton Town.

Wolves Player To Watch
Hwang Hee-Chan is their leading scorer with 5 goals in his last 7 league games. Two of these games he came on as a substitute. Leading with 5 assists in his last 6 games is Pedro Neto, he also scored one.

The Referee
Paul Tierney is in charge of this game and he was the referee for one of our games last season, at home against Manchester City.
 
I’ve looked at the last 4 league games for Wolves. Three were tough fixtures at home (to Liverpool, Man C and A Villa), and one away at Luton. They picked up 5 points from these games which based on xG was a much better haul than deserved. Unlike our last opponent, Everton, Wolves have been over-performing. In all games but 1 they were behind on xG, although at Luton they played for the majority of the game with 10 men. In all games except A Villa xG has been below 1 goal.

GoalsxG.JPG

The average positions of the starting line-ups are below. Although given the difficulties of the game (and taking into account the send-off at Luton) it may be that we cannot generalise from this to playing at AFCB. However, it isn’t a surprise that a Gary O’Neil team has the majority of the average positions within its own half.

Av Positions.JPG

Wolves have had 2 scorers in the games (Hee-Chan with 3 and Neto with 1) plus an own goal. 3 different players have contributed assists but Neto stands out with 3.

The following graph compares summary stats of Wolves and AFCB over the last 4 games. It shows a mixed picture, AFCB have had more goal attempts per game although the teams are level for big chances but Wolves have scored 5 goals to our 1. AFCB have conceded fewer chances in total but more big ones, and more goals (10 vs 6). AFCB have a marginally better xG, but noticeably worse xGc. With both teams averaging on xG less than a goal a game this could be a tight match.

Comparison.JPG

Both Wolves and AFCB have had less than 50% of possession. The percentage of chances from open play are fairly similar although AFCB are conceding more attempts from set pieces than Wolves although the two penalties conceded at Arsenal won’t help that statistic.

Percentages.JPG
 
Whilst I 'get' that this is one of our must win games, this isn't going to be easy.
It will be interesting to see if our players are still behind AI.
I think it's a confidence thing, so bearing in mind what happened against Arsenal where we were playing OK for the first 20 minutes until they scored, we need to score first.
I wish GON well but not for this Saturday..
 
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This has got the makings to be the GON derby! While Andoni probably doesn't have anything to prove against GON, he certainly needs a win right now, it's almost like this seasons script writers have this match in mind for the end of act 1
 
It’s really got to be a must win , we can’t go on with the odd draw .
As for GON let’s not be too nice eh . He’s the opposition manager FFS .
Anyway looking forward to it let’s hope we come out with attacking intent and we get behind the lads .
 
massive test for the new manager; team selection, tactics, player motivation

we were promised free-flowing, attacking football, the supposed antithesis to the previous incumbent
sadly, we've seen precious little so far
hope that changes on Saturday
 
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