Jeckyll And Hyde Cherries

Last updated : 05 August 2012 By Bournemouth Co-Ordinator

AFC Bournemouth continued their up-and-down pre-season with a 3-1 win over Winchester City in the week, with Josh McQuoid notching up a hat-trick, this after the Cherries lost against Poole Town 2-1 at Tatnam.

Manager Paul Groves isn't too worried at this stage, being quoted in the Bournemouth Evening Echo as saying: "Looking at the two games, the players stepped up their time on the pitch and we came through injury-free. The performances were mixed and, at this early stage, that is something we can accept. It is important we keep extending the players and we step up against Conference South clubs and then Championship and Premier League opposition. These games will give us a different kind of test. There will be times in the season when the pitch might not be suitable to try to play. When that happens, you have to adapt and we did that at Winchester, otherwise we would have brought pressure upon ourselves unnecessarily. The players did well to change to a different way of playing. We haven’t had the time to work on that type of situation so it was a good exercise. We will be asked questions throughout the pre-season games and we want to see how they react if they go behind. You want to see how they react to a defeat and, sometimes, you can learn more from that with regard to character of individuals. You want those questions to be asked now rather than later on".