- Bournemouth recovered from 3-0 down to beat Luton in a seven-goal thriller.
- Semenyo scored two goals in the home team’s spectacular comeback in the second half
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This was a game to celebrate comebacks. First and foremost, that of Tom Lockyer, the Luton captain who returned to the same stadium where he almost lost his life after cardiac arrest on a dark December day.
Then, Bournemouth, who stood out by coming back from 3-0 down at half-time to achieve a 4-3 victory at the Vitality Stadium thanks to a double from Antoine Semenyo.
His followers were delirious by the end. Perhaps because his team was so weak in the first half that this comeback never seemed possible.
However, this turned into a very entertaining encounter on what was an emotional evening on the south coast.
Lockyer wished he could have been on the field with his teammates, even though he knows how lucky he is to be here. It was on the Vitality where he was “technically dead” for two minutes and 40 seconds.
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Bournemouth went out of their way to welcome him. It’s not often that a rival player is chosen for the cover of the match programme, but they made an exception for Lockyer.
He was presented to the public before kick-off alongside the four paramedics who saved his life, while Bournemouth fans even raised over £2,000 to pay for buses for Luton fans to get to this rescheduled match.
These fans thought they had jumped out of the Premier League relegation zone at the expense of Nottingham Forest (their rivals this Saturday) when they went into half-time. But Bournemouth had other ideas, showing the fight they lacked in the first half.
It took Luton three minutes to take the lead in the original match in December, when Elijah Adebayo headed in Alfie Doughty’s cross. This time they took nine, although the entire sequence was the same in its simplicity. A cross from Jordan Clark was delicately finished off and Tahith Chong was left completely unmarked to beat Neto and make it 1-0.
Only Arsenal have scored more headers than Luton this season and Carlton Morris almost headed in another Issa Kabore cross.
Bournemouth could have equalized when Luis Sinisterra broke through after some good work from Dominic Solanke in the build-up, but the long legs of Thomas Kaminski denied them.
Instead, Luton made it 2-0 before the break when Chong played through Doughty, who played the ball perfectly into the path of Chiedozie Ogbene for a tap-in.
Issa Kabore was instrumental in helping Luton make it 3-0 before the break. He led a counterattack before setting up Ross Barkley, played by Cook. Playing this match in pain from a broken nose suffered at Crystal Palace, Barkley hit the ball into the back of the net.
That started a series of songs from the Luton fans. How they have Rob Edwards and he knows exactly what they need. How are they going to stay up and now we will believe them.
From the Bournemouth fans there was only booing. His team had been tormented by Chong, Kabore, Doughty and Barkley, who lives more in hope than expectation of an England call-up.
Another hoping to impress Gareth Southgate was Dominic Solanke and he scored to make it 3-1 after a clever backheel to Daiki Hashioka after 50 minutes.
When Illia Zabarnyi made it 3-2 in a goalmouth fight, Bournemouth were full of faith and on the rise. They didn’t have to wait long for their third, Semenyo turning Hashioka into a pretzel as he spun and spun before scoring past Kaminski to make it 3-3.
Fourteen minutes separated Bournemouth’s first and third goals, and now their fans signed the name of Andoni Iraola.
In the 83rd minute they completed the comeback. Semenyo picked up a through ball from Enes Unal and crashed it past Kaminsk
