Guardian writers\u2019 predicted position: 12th (NB: this is not necessarily Ben Fisher\u2019s prediction but the average of our writers\u2019 tips)<\/p>\n
Last season\u2019s position: 6th<\/p>\n
Prospects<\/p>\n
It was the day after the final game of last season at Bournemouth\u2019s secluded, swish training base and, before clearing his belongings on his last day in the building, the departing head coach, Andoni Iraola, spent a couple of hours in his office chewing the fat with his successor, Marco Rose, talking players, pubs and tactics. The story goes that, with time moving on, Tiago Pinto, the club\u2019s sporting director, knocked on the door to advise them there were other things to tackle.<\/p>\n
It was an interesting scenario that speaks volumes of the respect between the pair. Long before joining Bournemouth, Iraola cited Rose\u2019s Borussia M\u00f6nchengladbach side as one of his favourite teams to watch, the German\u2019s \u201cvertical football\u201d helping them qualify for the Champions League in Rose\u2019s first season in charge.<\/p>\n
Rose accepts that Iraola, in absorbing the sales of key players totalling more than \u00a3250m last season and qualifying for Europe for the first time, has set a high bar. Remarkably, Bournemouth did not lose a game after the sale of Antoine Semenyo in the second week of January. Rose put it succinctly during pre-season in Austria. \u201cAndoni didn\u2019t leave a lot of space to improve,\u201d he said. \u201cPressure\u2019s on.\u201d<\/p>\n
In his first session, Rose told the players he loved the way they attacked the Premier League last season. Playing in the Europa League, however, represents uncharted territory for a team in the second tier as recently as four years ago. It is why Bournemouth\u2019s hierarchy contacted peers at Crystal Palace and Nottingham Forest to understand the realities of juggling the Thursday-Sunday rhythm the competition will bring. Rose is close friends with Oliver Glasner, who is now at Forest, but won the Conference League last season with Palace<\/a>. \u201cWe are not going to Europe just to enjoy, we want to be competitive,\u201d Rose said. \u201cWe are not there just to watch.\u201d<\/p>\n Unlike last summer, so far they have retained all key players, chiefly Alex Scott, Rayan and Eli Junior Kroupi<\/a>, the 20-year-old forward who breezed into double figures in his debut Premier League season and the club consider a generational talent. Kroupi attracted serious interest from Paris Saint-Germain, among other European superpowers, but a freak foot injury during a pre-season drill means he is sidelined for at least three months.<\/p>\n At the end of the season, Bournemouth earmarked a centre-back to replace Marcos Senesi and a striker to compete with Evanilson as key priorities and by the start of August the club had recruited \u00c1lvaro Rodr\u00edguez, whom Rose wanted to sign at Leipzig, and Ant\u00f3nio Silva from Elche and Benfica respectively. Juanlu S\u00e1nchez joined from Sevilla to provide competition for Adam Smith, the evergreen 35-year-old into his 14th season at the club, and will also fill the void left by \u00c1lex Jim\u00e9nez, who has joined Fiorentina on loan with an option to sign permanently because he remains suspended in England while under investigation<\/a> by the Football Association.<\/p>\n Past five seasons<\/a>Off-field picture<\/p>\n The smallest stadium in the Premier League<\/a> has been a building site this summer, with the club working to ensure their 11,357-seater ground complies with Uefa regulations. There has been a wider facelift, too, with every seat being replaced, while they are filling in two corners to increase the capacity by 800 this season. Playing in Europe brings the challenge of meeting Uefa\u2019s squad-cost ratio (SCR) rules, which caps on-pitch spending at 70% of a club\u2019s revenue. Bournemouth finished the 2025-26 season at 82% and they continue to work towards meeting the threshold. Last month the academy was awarded category one status, four years after being category three.<\/p>\n Owner-fan relationship<\/p>\n The American billionaire Bill Foley described himself as a dictator upon buying the club approaching four years ago<\/a>, but supporters are grateful for his naked ambition. Foley, who made his fortune in insurance, is forthright and somewhat prophetic. In 2023, he said the club would play in Europe within five years \u2013 and achieved it in three. It was a similar story with Vegas Golden Knights, whom he vowed would win the Stanley Cup within six years of him launching the ice hockey franchise in 2017 \u2013 they won it in their sixth season. Foley recently added rugby union\u2019s Exeter Chiefs to his sporting stable<\/a>, which extends to Lorient, Auckland FC and Moreirense. Not every decision is universally popular but Foley, who turns 82 in December and predominantly splits his time between California and Vegas, puts his money where his mouth is<\/a>.<\/p>\n The manager<\/p>\n As a defender, Marco Rose was schooled by J\u00fcrgen Klopp and Thomas Tuchel at Mainz, and Ralf Rangnick at Hannover, so had quite the education before beginning his coaching career at home town club Lokomotive Leipzig. Klopp told Rose, after promotion to the Bundesliga in 2004, that he would excel in the dugout and he has since managed some of the biggest names: Erling Haaland and Jude Bellingham at Borussia Dortmund, Dominik Szoboszlai and Dani Olmo at RB Leipzig. Rose has been compared to Klopp and, naturally, Iraola, given his appetite for high-energy tactics. Bournemouth routed Genoa 10-1 in pre-season so, could his style be even more aggressive than Iraola\u2019s? \u201cI would say [to be] even more aggressive than Andoni is quite difficult,\u201d came the reply. His grandfather, Walter Rose, represented Germany in 1937.<\/p>\n Star signingAnt\u00f3nio Silva has all the attributes to be a bargain buy for Bournemouth. Photograph: Robin Jones\/AFC Bournemouth\/Getty Images<\/p>\n These days, \u00a350m is about the going rate for an elite defender. Tottenham paid \u00a352m to sign Jan Paul van Hecke. Chelsea paid the same fee to take Maxence Lacroix from Crystal Palace. Bournemouth pocketed \u00a350m when Dean Huijsen joined Real Madrid last year, though that price was set by a release clause. They are deals that make Bournemouth\u2019s \u00a325.7m purchase of Ant\u00f3nio Silva, a 22-year-old who has been a regular at Benfica since breaking into the team and has experience in the Champions League, Europa League and 20 caps for Portugal, appear a snip. Silva, who is right-footed but prefers to play as a left-centre back, is a direct replacement for Senesi.<\/p>\n Stat attack<\/p>\n Bournemouth scored nine goals from Opta-defined counterattacks last season, the joint most in the Premier League. But their threat was varied; in only two of their preceding eight top-flight campaigns did they score more set-piece goals than the 14 they managed in 2025-26. It is very rare for a team to be so productive on both fronts.<\/p>\n Stat attack<\/a>Set for a breakthrough<\/p>\n It was a November night of ecstasy when Scotland qualified for the World Cup for the first time in 28 years, but for Ben Gannon-Doak it was a bittersweet evening and one that curtailed his club season. The 20-year-old was forced off after 21 minutes, replaced by Kenny McLean who capped the scoring in style. A \u00a325m arrival from Liverpool last August, Gannon-Doak featured in all three of Scotland\u2019s World Cup matches, starting the first and last, and has impressed in pre-season. After being limited to 113 minutes in eight league appearances as a substitute last campaign, there is optimism Gannon-Doak will make his mark.<\/p>\n World Cup impact<\/p>\n Rayan became the first Brazilian teenager to start a World Cup match since Marco Ant\u00f4nio in 1970 when he was named in Carlo Ancelotti\u2019s starting XI for their Group C game against Scotland. The then 19-year-old, signed from Vasco de Gama in January, set up Vin\u00edcius J\u00fanior for Brazil\u2019s opener in the 3-0 win<\/a> and afterwards swapped shirts with Gannon-Doak. Tyler Adams enhanced his reputation, impressing for the USA en route to the last 16. Two new members of Bournemouth\u2019s coaching staff, the set-piece coach, Nicolas Gagnon, and goalkeeping coach, Frederic de Boever, worked with Canada and Belgium respectively. Alex Scott<\/a>\u2019s inclusion in Tuchel\u2019s pre-World Cup training camp in Florida spoke volumes of the Guernsey-born midfielder\u2019s wider standing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Guardian writers\u2019 predicted position: 12th (NB: this is not necessarily Ben Fisher\u2019s prediction but the average of our…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":580957,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":["post-580956","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580956","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=580956"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580956\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/580957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=580956"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=580956"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=580956"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}