AFCB

First Team

Parker craving touchline return after unenjoyable evening

AFC Bournemouth head coach Scott Parker revealed he didn’t enjoy sitting in the stands during the draw with Reading on Tuesday evening.

Parker served a one-game touchline suspension during the score draw with the Royals and admitted it wasn’t an experience he liked.

In his post-match press conference, he said: “It was frustrating to be honest; I’ve not enjoyed one bit of tonight.

“Whether we’d won, lost or drawn, the experience was not good because you’re not part of it and you don’t feel you can really influence it, but it is what it is.”

Dominic Solanke opened the scoring after just seven minutes with a well-worked goal but Tom Ince’s late equaliser ensured the points were shared at Vitality Stadium and Parker was left frustrated with his side’s performance.

Assessing the game post-match, he commented: “We played well for the first 15 or 20 minutes and then the game just slowly went away from us. I thought we were poor second half and I think on the run of it, they deserved their equaliser because we weren’t where we needed to be.

“I didn’t think there was an issue in terms of our fight. We just lacked that sharpness, we were a little slow with the ball, we lacked that precision, we were poor on the regain in terms of finding the next pass, the number of turnovers we had tonight – we were a little bit sloppy in our all-round game.”

Parker was complimentary of Reading’s performance on the evening with the Royals looking to secure Championship survival under interim manager Paul Ince.

“I thought Reading played very well, they were a good side, and they moved the ball. We just looked flat, we couldn’t get good pressure on it and we struggled in that sense.”

The Cherries head coach confirmed that the injury sustained by Leif Davis against Derby County at the weekend didn’t look too serious and emphasised that attention turns to ensuring a positive reaction against Huddersfield Town on Saturday.

“We’ve got a couple players coming back which is helpful, Leif’s injury doesn’t look that bad, I don’t think he’ll be too long.

“We’ve got five points over the last three home games, the points are ticking over but of course we’d like a better tally. We’ll regroup and go again; we’ve got a big game at the weekend.”