April 3 AFC Bournemouth 1-1 Colchester United Att: 6896

The opening period of the match was mainly Bournemouth as claimed the first chance of the match, through Jorgensen who could only claim a corner within the first 5 minutes of the game. Unfortunately, the corner was up to our normal standard as we failed to find a Bournemouth player.

But that was just about as close as it got as the killer instinct in the final third was sadly missing as the bulk of the first period was largely forgettable.

Then the unforgivable happened!! Colchester won a corner, we dragged every man back to defend the corner ...... now at this stage you would have thought that having everyone back would have meant that everyone would be marked and dealt with. Sadly though, this was not the case as the only unmarked player (Halford) was at the far post was free to head home on 35 minutes. Such disappointment. Colchester should have made it 2 on the stroke of half time as the visitors broke the offside trap (no thanks to an absent ref's assistant flag which should have been rasied). Neil Moss came off his line to thwart the attempt with a superb save.

HT: 0-1

The second half wasn't much better even though Bournemouth had plenty of endeavour to claim an equaliser. It just seemed that it simply wasn't to be even after the 2nd and 3rd penalty appeal!!

What chances we did create were too easy for Colchester to deal with as everything seemed to be straight to the keeper, or possession conceeded too easily - we were our own worst enemies!! When we did get through, Claus was guilty of thumping the ball against the cross bar with some venom.

The substitutions made a difference as they gave Bournemouth fresh impetus and some fresh ideas. Sadly the departure of Feeney will probably mean that he will be out for a week or two.

Bournemouth did apply far more pressure in search of the all important goal to level matters, without actually creating anything!!

The equaliser did come, eventually as Hayter managed to loop the ball over the keepers head from close range. Scrappy yes, but could be a vital point in the final analysis. Carl Fletcher produced a superb strike on 88 minutes, which narrowly missed the left hand upright. It would have been a fine goal if only on target!! But as it proved, this was the final throw of the dice!!

Overall, a poor team performance, compared with what we have been used to in recent weeks - must do better!!

Man Of The Match?? Cummings purely for endeavour and running, close behind was Hayter.

AFCB: Moss, Purches, Cummings, Maher, C Fletcher, Buxton, Jorgensen, Stock, Feeney, S Fletcher, Hayter
Subs: Holmes (for Stock on 70), Elliott, O'Connor (for Maher, 76), Browning (for Feeney on 76), Broadhurst

Andy Burton, Portsmouth