Dan Gosling described Bournemouth’s relegation to the Sky Bet Championship as ‘heart-breaking’ after going down by a point.
AFC Bournemouth’s relegation came in a Premier League season which ended strangely due to the Coronavirus pandemic. The virus put the country into lockdown, but also stalled the sporting world and prevented any matches being played for one hundred days in the Premier League. At first, Gosling said this was a positive for the lads in red and black.
“Lockdown was good for me personally; I think for the team as well. Speaking on behalf of the boys, I know we felt a lot more relaxed; the pressure was still there, the pressure was growing and then lockdown happened, and we could sort of forget about football for a few weeks.”
However, once the season got back under way The Cherries did not get off to a good start, losing their first three games, which the central midfielder believed drained the confidence the team had in the hope to stay in the Premier League.
“As soon as project restart went ahead the pressure was there again, and obviously we didn’t get off to a good start and was sort of banking on winning one of the first three games, Newcastle, Palace at home, and Wolves away, and we lost all three which just drained all the confidence that we had.”
Bournemouth still had a chance of survival going into the final game of the season if they beat Everton, and Aston Villa lost, but only one result went their way. The Cherries beat Everton 3-1 and Aston Villa drew with West Ham, resulting in Bournemouth going down by a single point. Gosling knew relying on other team’s results was not going to be enough and luck clearly was not on their side.
“We had a little push at the end, but it was too little too late and relying on other people’s results, you know you have to get lucky and ultimately the results didn’t go for us and we went down by a point.”
“It was sickening really playing at Everton last game of the season, beating them and then watching the scores come in. It was just heart-breaking being involved in a relegation; no player wants that on their CV.”
The thirty-year-old judged his side to be slightly unfortunate throughout the season due to injuries, but completely understands that they did not deserve to stay up and these excuses cannot be made at this level as you do get punished.
“It was just unfortunate, we had a lot of injuries and people out of form, just a lot of things went against us really, but it’s over 38 games and if you’re in the bottom three after that you ultimately don’t deserve to stay in the league. But yeah, it is time to really move on.”
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