A win will see City go straight to the top of the league, if only for a matter of hours. And, if City’s history against ‘The Cherries’ is anything to go by, we should be seeing City’s name at the top of the tree come the full time whistle.
History Between The Two Clubs:
The two clubs have only met ten times in league competition, with the Blues victorious on eight of those occasions. Last season, under Pep, we didn’t concede a goal over the two matches, winning 4-0 at our place before coming back from their place with a 2-0 victory.
In fact you have to go back to the 17th October 2015 for the last time Bournemouth scored against us. That game was officiated by Mike Dean, our referee again this Saturday, but that wasn’t the weirdest thing about the game. Indeed, not only did Raheem score a hat-trick, Wilfried Bony scored a brace! Glenn Murray scored in the 22nd minute for the visitors to make the score 2-1, with the game finally ending 5-1 to the Blues.
The previous meeting between the two took place on the 13th February 1999, when we were both in the second tier of English football. That game ended 0-0 and was the last time they took points from us, and the only time they blanked us.
Managers And Players Shared:
Previous Bournemouth managers include Mel Mechin, our manager from 1987 through to November 1989. In fact, Mel managed us through three of the ten games against the Cherries, a club he had previously played for. After his retirement as a player he joined us before heading to Bournemouth, via Barnsley, where he managed them in another two of the ten fixtures.
Another guy involved in both sides is Lee Bradbury. He didn’t really set Maine Road fans in to uncontrollable rages of excitement, but did score 10 in 40 appearances for us. Towards the end of his career he would play for, and then manage Bournemouth for a season before moving on.
Sylvain Distin, of course more recognized as a Manchester City player. Turning out almost 200 times for us before going to Portsmouth and then Everton. Finally though, for a season and a dozen appearances, he was a Cherry.
Ian Bishop also spent a spell at Bournemouth, heading to us on two occasions. Bish was with us for the second time when we pushed our way back to the Premier League from the third tier of English football.
Playing for us from 2004-2006 was a guy called David James. Fifty plus appearances for England and almost a century for City. Towards the end of his career, aged 42, he turned out for Bournemouth briefly.
No comments:
Post a Comment