Francis: One Premier League game looked a long way off in those days!

Francis, who made 136 of his 324 appearances for the club in the top flight, was speaking after the Cherries had played their 200^th game in the Premier League.

The Dorset club’s tenth league game of the season against Fulham brought up the milestone at Craven Cottage, adding to the 190 matches played between 2015 and 2020.

Francis, now assistant first-team technical director at Vitality Stadium, joined the club in November 2011 when they were languishing in the lower reaches of League One.

He told afcb.co.uk: “I think one Premier League game looked a long way off in those days, never mind 200!

“It certainly did for me because coming to Bournemouth from Charlton was a step down in division but I needed games and I needed to play.

“I never thought then that I would go on to play so many games in the Premier League and didn’t realise just how much of a journey the club would go on.

“What has summed up the 200 games is that nobody outside of the football club would have thought it was possible.

“But as our motto says, ‘Together, anything is possible’ and everyone at the club has carried that to reach this excellent achievement.

“When we reached the Premier League the first time, we believed in ourselves, we had Eddie Howe as manager and not many of the players had played there before.

“We were hungry to prove a lot of people wrong and our character and fearlessness got us through the first season.

“We never had any nerves going into games and wanted to face everything head on and show what we were about.

“We kept evolving as players, as did Eddie as manager, and everybody wanted to strive to be better with every season.

“At the start of every season, the pundits and people outside of the club would say we couldn’t sustain it but we kept proving them wrong.”

Francis was ever present as the Cherries finished 16^th in their debut campaign in the top flight in 2015/16 before missing just four games when they came a club-best ninth the following season.

He featured prominently when they finished 12^th in 2017/18 before injury restricted him to 32 appearances across 2018/19 and 2019/20.

The defender, who made 644 career appearances for seven clubs, also skippered the Cherries in the Premier League before hanging up his boots at the end of 2019/20.

Since taking up his new role in June 2021, Francis has worked as part of a recruitment team which helped the Cherries regain a place in the Premier League following a two-year absence.

He said: “Getting back up at the second attempt was huge and there were a lot of reasons behind it.

“Some of the football we played in the Championship was excellent and we had such good players for the level.

“A lot of the players who had been relegated managed to turn that stress into motivation to want to get back.

“It’s difficult trying to convince Premier League players to stay in the Championship for longer than two years and I think that’s huge credit to everybody at the club for getting the best out of those players.

“Recruitment plays a big part in it. Although we were relegated, we sold players so that went in our favour financially and we’ve still got major assets who have stayed with us on the journey.

“Every club has highs and lows. There are so many in the Championship and below that have been in the Premier League and couldn’t get back at the first or second attempt so we knew how important that would be and is great credit to everybody associated with the club.” 

FRANNO’S FAVOURITE FIVE 

AUGUST 2015 – WEST HAM (a) 4-3

To get our first win in the Premier League so early in the season was a great achievement and very important for confidence.

We suffered defeats in our first two games against Aston Villa and Liverpool and you could see the margins were going to be very small.

I played in teams which didn’t win four or five games at the start of the season and then all your targets go out of the window.

We had a great start against West Ham and Callum Wilson scored twice to give us a 2-0 lead. They got it back to 2-2 before Pughie scored with one of his legendary chop goals to put us back in front.

Cal got his hat-trick from the penalty spot after they had had a player sent off and we defended well after they had scored to make it 4-3.

I remember the feeling after the game knowing we had arrived almost. It was another one of those proving people wrong moments that we could win away from home so early on.

DECEMBER 2016 – LIVERPOOL (h) 4-3

This game still gets played on Sky Sports all the time and it’s a nice one to re-live every now and then at home.

The bigger clubs were starting to get a lot stronger. Jurgen Klopp had improved Liverpool, Pep Guardiola had taken over at Manchester City and Chelsea and Spurs were really strong.

It was probably just the way the game went. I just felt it had got away from us in the first half and we were really poor and deserved to be losing 2-0.

Eddie let us know at half-time and, of course, I wasn’t sitting there thinking we could win 4-3.

But once we got a goal back through Cal’s penalty in the second half, the momentum shifted a little and they started making a few mistakes at the back.

Although they restored their two-goal lead, we scored twice in quick succession through Ryan Fraser and Steve Cook to make it 3-3.

We were always good at exploiting another team’s weaknesses. At the time, Liverpool weren’t the best at the back and we knew any kind of uncomfortable ball in behind their defence would cause problems.

We stuck to what we knew best and, fortunately, it went our way in the second half when Nathan Ake popped up with the winner in the last minute. The scenes were incredible after the game.

DECEMBER 2015 – CHELSEA (a) 1-0

It’s incredible to think this was the first of three wins against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in our first five seasons in the Premier League. That was an outstanding achievement.

I suppose it just felt like we had their number. When you win somewhere once, you always think you can do it again when you go back. You always have those feelings when you go to different stadiums.

We were on a bad run and hadn’t won for a while and not too many people gave us a chance against the reigning champions in their own back yard.

But we defended superbly and Glenn Murray came up trumps by scoring the only goal late on. It was a special game.

On a personal level, I enjoyed the win at Stamford Bridge in 2019/20 when Dan Gosling scored. It was a huge moment for me because I came back from my ACL. I wanted to put on the shirt and lead out the team to get a bit of closure.

You would have to say the 3-0 win there in 2018 was probably the most complete performance. We showed we could mix it with any of the best teams in the league on our day.

DECEMBER 2015 – MANCHESTER UNITED (h) 2-1 

This will go down as the game I will never forget due to the tragic circumstances of Harry Arter and his partner Rachel losing their baby daughter.

I remember every minute of the game and the days leading up to it. It will always stick out in my mind and I know it will with all the boys who played that day.

There was a surreal feeling and a special feeling in the dressing room before the game. There was a lot of pent up emotion inside everybody.

We all felt Harry’s grief and, sitting in the dressing room, all we wanted to do was go out and perform for him and his family and we did.

It wasn’t as if we nicked a result either, we were excellent and put Manchester United under all sorts of pressure throughout the game.

Coming off the back of the Chelsea win, it set us up for a really productive few games so that was special.

JANUARY 2018 – ARSENAL (h) 2-1

I remember it very well – it was my wife’s 30^th birthday on the Saturday night and I had hired a room and arranged a party at the Hilton.

Then, they switched the fixture to the Sunday so I had to change my plans at the last minute and so did everyone else.

The party was re-arranged for the Sunday night, although it was touch and go depending on the result.

We had to make sure we won otherwise Eddie would have found out everybody had gone out and wouldn’t have been best pleased so it was a good job we did win.

It wasn’t looking good when they took the lead through Hector Bellerin but Cal and Jordon Ibe scored in the second half to earn us the win.

Until this win, we hadn’t had good results against Arsenal and I got sent off against them in the 3-3 draw the previous season.

The party was a great way to celebrate!