Bournemouth complete first season guide

Here we go with another guide on how to manage your Premier League club in the first season. The idea behind this guide is to manage each Premier League team through the first season. We will first go through to the January mid point and an other edition through to the end of the season.

This time around we will be doing a guide on AFC Bournemouth. Bournemouth are looking to secure their place in the Premier League after surviving the relegation battle last season. Bournemouth play some marvellous football and can be very entertaining, time to make them successful in Football Manager 24. The Bournemouth guide to set up your team can be found here.

In this guide we are going to:

• Look at the league performance and individual performances.
• We will look at the tactics which have been used in Football Manager 24.
• Potential transfers and areas of improvement.

Read on if you want continue the Bournemouth story and take them further!

Bournemouth Results

This is where we review the results. This can be very interesting as you can calculate how many you may receive from each game, where you are projected to finish and what type of team you can beat.

The season started well, going unbeaten in the league for 10 games. In that time we beat a number of good teams such as Arsenal and Everton. We should have also beaten Liverpool and Man Utd, but they were simply too strong for us. As you can see that our season has started to go down hill slightly.

November was a touch month losing to both Aston Villa and Newcastle United. They were both sitting around me in the league, so it was a double blow. December started badly with a battering by Burnley and just losing out to Chelsea. If these games had gone the other way we would have been sitting in a great spot.

Our start to the season was so good that it has helped us in our battle to stay up. The board just want us to avoid relegation this year, normally that would mean aiming for 40 points plus. At the half way point we already have 28 points, which means that we need 12 more points to mathematically stay up. The board and supporters should be very happy with how the team have performed.

As a mid point review of the season we have more than succeeded in our goals. We have a positive goal difference which is a major achievement in the Premier League. Looking at the league stats we have scored 30 goals, which is 1.5 goals a game. Offensively we are looking good, defensively we have conceded 26 goals, which is higher than the teams above us.

Individual Performance

In this section we look at the individual performance of each player in the squad. If you have team problem then you can bet your bottom dollar that you can solve the problem by drilling down to individual performance. This is a form of straight line theory and can improve outcomes without a large shift.

We have had a few outstanding individuals in this team according to the average ratings. Traore, Billing, Kluivert and Sinisterra all performed amazingly. I don’t think there is any coincidence that they are all attacking players. The defence has been leaky and struggles to stand up to late pressure.

Traore has been the most surprising player, for someone I have not heard much about he has been a bit of a saviour for us. Solanke has been terrible in front of goal, so Traore stepped up from AMC. There is plenty of room for change at the back, the defence is just not that good on football manager 24.

The main thing we need to think about here is how do we help secure the defence up. While it is not terrible, we need to look at the future, as I have said in the past if we can concede 10 less goals it equates to an extra 2.61 wins. As well as that, we need to find a recognised forward as Solanke is just not clinical.

Bournemouth Tactics

This section is dedicated to looking the tactic I have been using this season and how we can improve it using the data above. We will look at the original strategy, how it has changed and we should change it going forward.

This strategy is about creating goal scoring opportunities. What was meant to happen is that Solanke would become the biggest threat in the league off the back of all the opportunities. This has not happened and actually he has become a bit of a ghost striker, sitting at the top of the team not scoring or assisting. The midfield on the other hand have been outshining everyone else.

So we understand how the goals are being scored and the problem we have up front. We now move on to looking at the goals we are conceding. The downside to this formation is that we have no DM, this is such an easy way to to shore up the defence. We can push the MCs back and leave a gap, or we can change the AMC for a DM flipping the midfield as such.

We also have a few youngsters, or wonderkids on football manager 24. These players will take time to grow and become the superstars of tomorrow, both are in the defence. Zabarnyi is our first team choice and growing, Kerkaz the left back is rotating with Kelly to get his feel. Another option is to see if we are a low, mid or high block.

Conclusion

So far so good, we have advanced Bournemouth up the table through their attacking prowess and are in a good position. Going forward the attack is fine for now, but the defence needs to worked on. They have low average ratings, struggling under pressure and are fairly young, but there is much we can do.

The main strength of this team is the midfield, the have enjoyed the freedom of the 5 man midfield and have created a lot of opportunities as well as finished them. The weakness of the team is the defence and we have discussed what we will do with them going forward.

The opportunity with this team is how young the team are and they are already playing great football. We need to harness the mentality of the youth system set up and bring in coaches that enjoy working with youngsters and motivate them. The threat is ignoring the striker situation, there are a few things we can do like changing roles and formation, but I think bringing in someone new is the best option.

Load up a game with Bournemouth today, I guarantee you will not be disappointed. I have really enjoyed this save so far. Please like and comment what you think on this series.