The Cherries travel to Basingstoke tonight (kick off 7.45pm) and then Havant & Waterlooville on Wednesday (kick off 7.45pm) as the side step up their pre-season preparations against Conference South opposition.
Basingstoke drew 1-1 at AFC Totton in their last friendly and previously had beaten a Reading eleven 5-0 and won 3-2 at Winchester.
For Havant, it’s their sixth and a half friendly! Their match against Winchester was abandoned at half time, while a home game against Portsmouth was called off before kick off, both due to waterlogged pitches! Since then, they have won 3-0 at Petersfield, beaten Carshalton 2-1 at home, lost 3-1 at Downton, drew 1-1 at home against Bognor and on Saturday, beat Sholing 1-0 at home.
As with last weekend’s matches against Southern League opposition, Paul Groves is set to send two strong teams to face the sides who are two steps down from the Football League.
“We will follow a similar sort of format as the Poole and Winchester games where we will split the two teams up. We will again add to the amount of time they get on the field. We know that the games will be tougher as we play Conference South opposition and it’s important that we continue to extend the players. We then play Reading Cardiff and Bristol City and they will provide a different sort of opposition to what the non-league clubs have.”