Bourne Legacy: Carl Fletcher

Fletcher, who made more than 200 appearances for the club, scored twice against the Imps as Sean O’Driscoll’s team ran out 5-2 winners at the Millennium Stadium.

He left to join West Ham in August 2004 and played for the Hammers in the Premier League and 2006 FA Cup final against Liverpool.

Capped 36 times by Wales, Fletcher returned to the Cherries as youth team boss in January 2014 and is the club’s loan player manager.

What are your memories of your debut when you came off the bench in a 2-1 defeat at Grimsby in February 1998?

I came on just after we had gone 2-1 down and was really pleased to get out there and play even though we were losing.

I wasn’t on for very long but it was great to get my first few touches in professional football. I didn’t think too much about it and that was probably one of the bonuses of being young.

You just go with it and don’t worry too much about what it means or what’s expected. You just go out and play.

It must have been frustrating to wait 20 months to make your full debut in a 2-2 draw at Bury in October 1999?

I waited a while to make my full debut but I was still a young player. I wasn’t at the stage where I was suddenly going to come through and play every game.

I remember arriving at the ground and John Williams giving me his mobile phone and asking me if I wanted to phone my mum and dad to tell them I would be starting.

I don’t remember too much about the game but I know I played right midfield.

It was just great to be playing in front of a crowd and in a proper game. And it was nice we didn’t lose the game.

What are you recollections of the 2000/01 season?

It was one of those seasons when you had ten seasons in one.

We were all very young and the club didn’t have the money to go out and buy loads of players so a lot of us came through at the same time. The average age of the team was one of the lowest we’d had for a few years.

We didn’t start the season well and, where we were young, we didn’t have the experience to dig ourselves out of it.

Looking back, we were probably fortunate that the club didn’t have any money to buy players so we were able to come through it together.

Jermain Defoe coming in on loan was the catalyst. He gave us a focal point. We would work hard and knew we had someone who could win the game for us.

In this day and age, we probably wouldn’t have been given the time to get through the bad spell. New players would have been brought in and we would have been thrown back in the reserves.

We didn’t have too many bad performances but were just a bit naïve in certain areas. We grew as a group and Jermain gave us an end product.

And your memories of the following season when you tasted relegation?

Missing out on the play-offs the previous season was a big blow and maybe we came back with a bit of a hangover.

We kept winning the previous season and it was like a snowball effect. It worked the opposite way during the season we went down.

Jermain had gone back and we had injuries to Steve Fletcher and Neil Young, two of our most experienced players.

Again, it was an experience in this day and age that we wouldn’t have been able to go through because the manager would have changed and new players would have come in.

Credit to Peter Phillips, the chairman. He stuck with Sean O’Driscoll and we were able to go through the experience. We learned so much from it and a lot of us forged a career on the back of it.

What was it like to skipper the team to glory at the Millennium Stadium in 2003?

To score and to captain your hometown club to victory in a play-off final was a great feeling.

For someone who grew up in the area, I had so many memories of the club and being at the club, not just of playing but of watching as well.

We had great support in Cardiff and it was one of my best seasons in football. I was on cloud nine for a long period after it.

How did your move to West Ham come about?

My last game for Bournemouth was away to Luton and it was all done during the week leading up to the game. In those days, it was financially beneficial for the club to sell players.

Before the game, Sean asked me if I wanted to play and I did. That probably wouldn’t happen now because the buying club would never allow it.

In the changing room after the game, Sean asked me if he could tell the players because none of them knew I was leaving.

It was a really emotional time. I cried and it was a strange feeling. Something which had been a big part of my life for so long was about to change.

It was a pivotal moment because I had such an affiliation with the club. But for all the heart-wrenching stuff I went through, I was glad to leave from a life perspective.

I needed to get out, mix with different people and experience something different. Looking back, I was glad I made the decision to go.

Can you remember when the Cherries kitman forgot to pack your shirt and a female supporter came to your rescue?

Yes, I can!

It was away to Notts County and we lost 5-1. We were 3-0 down after about 10 minutes. I had to play right-back because we had an injury and got taken off at half-time.

The kitman went to the ground in the morning to hang up all the shirts and realised he had forgotten mine.

When the supporters started arriving, he tried to see if anyone had a shirt he could get my name printed on.

Someone had one with my name on and it was a female supporter. I ended up wearing it during the game. It certainly didn’t bring me any luck!

Did people ever think you were related to Steve Fletcher?

Yes, all the time!

When I was first coming through, we were known as Big Fletch and Little Fletch and that’s the way it’s stayed ever since.

Who was the best player you played with at AFC Bournemouth?

There were lots!

I trained quite a lot with Rio Ferdinand when he came here on loan. You could see he was really good. He was close to my age but the difference physically was quite an eye-opener to me.

Mark Stein was an excellent player and I really liked playing with him, as was Jermain Defoe.

When I played, we were all quite young and all at a similar level. We pushed each other to get better and better and that was one of the big benefits we had. We were all willing to learn and work hard.

We had a great group which included the likes of Richard Hughes, Claus Jorgensen, Neil Young, Wade Elliott, the gaffer and James Hayter.

We all came through together and all went on to have good careers and I think Sean O’Driscoll deserves a lot of credit for that.

What would you pick as your champagne moment at the club?

I have two memorable moments.

The first is my second goal in the play-off final against Lincoln at Cardiff because I knew we had won then.

It was 4-2 at the time and another goal from them could have made it interesting. But that goal made it 5-2 to us with not too long left.

That was when all the emotion came out and we knew we would be celebrating at the final whistle.

Taking everything into consideration, like following the club as a kid, living in the area, progressing through the youth ranks and making my debut, that was the main one in terms of good memories.

The other one which sticks out in my mind is my last game for the club.

It was emotional knowing I would be leaving somewhere I had been for so long because the club had been such a massive part of my life.

After spending so many years at the club and getting to know so many different people, I was moving out of my comfort zone and going into something else.

They are two memorable moments which were memorable for very different reasons.

This article first appeared in MATCHDAY for our game against West Ham.