Ryan Christie
Christie, 28, is heading into the final year of his deal at Vitality Stadium, having arrived from Celtic in the summer of 2021. The Scotland international has made 75 appearances for Cherries, scoring five goals and providing nine assists. He played a key role in clinching promotion from the Championship, before then helping keep the club in the Premier League last season. The hard-working midfielder has featured in both friendly matches under new boss Andoni Iraola so far. He played 90 minutes in the 4-0 win over Hibernian, before again starting and playing the first half of Sunday’s 1-0 loss to Maccabi Tel Aviv. Christie has previously expressed how settled he feels on the south coast of England, becoming a dad for the first time last month. Asked if there has been any dialogue with the club regarding his future and current contract situation,
Ryan Christie said: “No discussions yet, but I’m more than happy (here). Especially with the baby now, I love living in Bournemouth. It’s a great place to stay and my family is nice and settled as well. I’m not really thinking about that right now. Obviously the pre-season is pretty tough, so you just need to get the head down and keep working hard. My main hope is to impress the new boss as much as I can. If that leads to talks about a new contract, so be it. I’ll be looking forward to that hopefully.”
Christie and his fiancée Georgie welcomed a baby boy into the world last month. For Christie, that capped off a busy summer, which had seen him away representing Scotland just five days before his son was born.
Ryan Christie said: “It was absolutely amazing, to be fair. It was obviously a bit of a whirlwind when he came, but I think we kind of timed it perfectly. I got back from Scotland camp and two days later we went into labour. It was nice because I got two weeks at the end of my break just in the house with him getting used to baby life.”
Christie’s final game before returning home was the bizarre Euro 2024 qualifier against Georgia at Hampden Park. The Highlander was introduced for the closing stages of the 2-0 win, coming onto the pitch at 11.16pm after the game had been delayed due to wet weather in Glasgow.
Ryan Christie said: “That was one of the strangest games I’ve been a part of. The rain was absolutely mental and then there was talk of the game being postponed and playing the next morning. I think everybody was desperate just to get the game done, especially me with a pregnant fiancée at home, waiting for me to get home. So I was watching the clock half the night! The most important thing is we got a win to round off another very successful camp for us.”
