Cherries Draw At Leicester City Secures Top Half of EPL Table Finish

Stasha_Sz

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Jun 13, 2016
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AFC Bournemouth's 1-1 draw at Leicester City on the final day of the 1016/17 EPL season has secured a 9th place finish for the Cherries, with 46 points. Bournemouth, written off by most pundits as a "one and done" team after last year's first time promotion to the EPL, has confounded critics by not only staying up, but finishing with a top half of the table season result, despite having no marquee international star on the team, having the third lowest team budget in the league and playing in the smallest venue of any team in the EPL.

Junior Stanislas stunned the defending champs just 59 seconds into the match converting a Ryan Fraser rebound off Fox's keeper Kasper Schmeichel to silence the King Power Stadium faithful, giving Eddie Howe's boys a 1-0 lead. The Foxes equalized at the 51st minute when England international Jamie Vardy finished a series of crosses from Ben Chilwell and Islam Slimani from one yard out.

Defending champs, Leicester City, finished the season a disappointing 12th on 45 points, which included the midseason sacking of manager Claudio Ranieri, as a resurgent Chelsea grabbed the league crown. Newly promoted Hull City and Middlesbrough along with Sunderland suffered relegation to the Championship.

The Cherries were within 15 minutes of closing down permanently in 1997 when the club's trust fund stepped in and took them out of receivership, thus forming Europe's first ever community Club.

Bournemouth, whose combined club salary of just under €38 million this year, was dwarfed by perennial league top spenders Man City, Man U and Chelsea, whom are all in the €250 million range. Dean Court, the Cherries' venue, seats a mere 11,700 supporters as compared to the massive Old Trafford's 75,000+. Journeyman striker, Joshua King, Bournemouth's top scorer has played on 5 different teams since he began top flight football in 2009.

The 2016/2017 season will definitely be seen as one of David slaying Goliath as far as the Cherries are concerned.
Official Website of the Cherries - AFC Bournemouth latest news, photos and videos
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