Southampton loanee Stephens played the full 90 minutes of the 4-1 defeat on Saturday evening, with City capitalising on Cherries’ errors at the back. Two loose passes paved the way for two of City’s three first-half goals, Julian Alvarez and Phil Foden the beneficiaries from Hamed Traore and Phil Billing’s misplaced balls. Those strikes sandwiched Erling Haaland’s goal, which came about after Cherries had been split open by Nathan Ake’s ball from deep. A second-half own goal from Chris Mepham was further damage, before Jefferson Lerma restored some pride with a late strike. Discussing the game,
Stephens told the Daily Echo: “Obviously, it’s a tough one.
Jack Stephens said: “They’re a brilliant side. We’ve tried to be aggressive with them and we did that, caused some problems, but obviously, they punished us with a few mistakes and that’s what they do, that’s what they’re really good at. They’re ruthless and that’s what it’s about. I thought we stuck at it, we kept going. It’s very easy to go under there, 3-0 down at halftime and 4-0 just after the break. Very difficult, but we stuck at it and got to take this one on the chin.”
Stephens and Cherries had faced a very different proposition the previous weekend in a 1-0 win over Wolves. The Cherries defence had to sit deep and contend with multiple crosses into the box, whilst against City, they faced a Pep Guardiola side looking to keep the ball on the deck. Asked about the differing styles Cherries had faced in recent weeks,
Jack Stephens responded: “I think that’s the Premier League. Every challenge is different. Like you say, last week was a lot of balls in the box, under a lot of pressure defending the box. Whereas (against City), strangely, you’d think that you’d be defending the box a lot more, but it didn’t feel like that. They obviously take you to places that are uncomfortable. They drag you out. There’s not so much long balls, everything’s on the floor. It’s a lot of concentration and just trying to stay in it because you don’t have the ball for long periods, you know that’s going to happen. They do that against every team that they play against. That’s not just Bournemouth, you see it in the Champions League. They have 60, 70 per cent possession against top teams. So you’ve got to accept that that’s what they’re going to do, and you need to stay concentrated. And when we win the ball back, we try to be positive with the ball. I think we obviously gave the ball away a few times first half, but like I said, they punished us with them, and then we tightened up. I think we did tighten it up second half. The football was a lot better, and we did create chances, there’s no denying that. But unfortunately we’ve been punished and it’s 4-1, and we have to take that.”
