First Southampton put eight past Sunderland; now a week later and Bournemouth have banged in eight without reply, with beleaguered Birmingham on the receiving end of a drubbing. With south-coast clubs clearly in rich goal-scoring mood, Carlisle, who visit Portsmouth on 1 November, must be quaking in their boots.
On Saturday Eddie Howe’s Bournemouth team racked up a record league win and inflicted a record home defeat on a Birmingham team reduced to 10 men after five minutes. As well as scoring eight times, they also hit the post twice, once in each half, and missed at least four more chances to run up double figures.
There have been some dark days in the Blues’ troubled history of late, but few as dark as this. Malcolm Crosby, Birmingham’s co-caretaker manager, apologised to the club’s supporters – and issued a stark warning to his players. “It was embarrassing, the players became passive. The players have to get over it, or they won’t be in the game much longer.”
Howe said: “I don’t know where to start, so much happened. We made a terrific start by scoring, the sending-off went our way, and then we put them to the sword in the second half.”
