Bournemouth facing goalkeeper crisis ahead of Chelsea trip

Howe takes his team to Stamford Bridge for a Saturday Night Football clash with Jose Mourinho’s side, live on Sky Sports 1 HD.

But before Atsu’s injury problems began he had failed to make the Bournemouth squad for a single Premier League game with manager Eddie Howe revealing the former Vitesse Arnhem loanee’s injury problems has cost him his place in his regular squad.

The club will certainly need to sell before they buy players in the January Transfer Window and Eddie Howe will have to be smart in his decisions to find potential quality to save the Cherries and fill the absence of Callum Wilson.

“It was certainly a nice feeling at the end of the game”, the 38-year-old said, recalling the second of Junior Stanislas’ levellers after Ross Barkley had briefly restored the visitors’ lead at the Vitality Stadium.

‘If you had told me that at the start of the season I think I would have thought we would be around the top four.

“I didn’t expect to be so close to them (in the table) but I think they are in a false position (14th)”.

“I think we’re in a good place and what we’ve found at this level is if we’re in a good place and we perform, we compete”. It is just about trying to get the better of the individual battles. “As always when we’re preparing for a game it’s all about us”.

“What we are looking to do now is to turn our performances into wins, and hopefully a game like Everton can be the catalyst for that”.

“Our last two away games have been – sorry the Swansea game was excellent – and the Everton game again in patches we were terrific, so I think we’re building momentum in terms of our performance levels”. Of course, ideally, you’d like to rubber stamp those with wins.

Atsu is on a season-long loan spell at Bournemouth from Chelsea but his game-time has been limited to two League Cup appearances.

Howe, however, is remaining positive and said: “Whenever you get injuries it’s a test, it’s a challenge to adapt”.