Bournemouth cruise to victory over Fulham as Luton blunt Blades

Bournemouth continued their superb run of form under manager Andoni Iraola as they defeated Fulham 3-0 at the Vitality Stadium yesterday.

The Cherries opened the scoring just before half-time when Alex Scott took the ball on the halfway line and sprinted through the Fulham defence to set up Justin Kluivert, who fired past keeper Bernd Leno.

Dominic Solanke doubled the advantage from the penalty spot just past the hour mark, sending Leno the wrong way for his 12th goal of the season.

Substitute Luis Sinisterra wrapped it up for Bournemouth

with a brilliant finish in stoppage time, with the winger cutting in from the left before firing an unstoppable shot into the top-right corner from 25 yards.

It was Bournemouth’s fourth win in a row – and their fifth in six games – that lifts Iraola’s side into the top half of the Premier League.

“Now we are flying,” said Dutch attacker Kluivert.

“The whole squad, we’ve got a great team, great spirit. We’re doing good.

“It’s wonderful. We’ve got to know each other. I’m new, the coach is new.

“At the beginning we were struggling, we were losing but we’ve found our feet. At the beginning of the season the coach had an idea and we lost a lot of games, but we did the same thing.

“We believed in him, he believed in us and the results came. It’s good, it’s always good if you win, a good feeling.”

It was Fulham’s third defeat in a row without scoring that leaves them sitting in 13th spot in the table.

And goalkeeper Leno could find himself in trouble with the Premier League after pushing a ball boy who he felt was taking too long to return the ball for a goal-kick.

Carlton Morris climbed off the bench to create two own goals in four minutes for Luton as they beat fellow strugglers Sheffield United 3-2 in a crucial basement battle.

The Blades were on course for an important victory as goals from Oli McBurnie and Anel Ahmedhodzic overturned Alfie Doughty’s first-half opener for the Hatters.

But substitute Morris was the orchestrator as Jack Robinson and Ben Slimane put through their own net to give Luton back-to-back Premier League wins for the first time.

Sheffield United remain bottom of the table, two places and six points behind Luton having played one more game than the Hatters.

The match was also notable for being the first Premier League game to be officiated by a black referee for 15 years as Sam Allison took the whistle and he mainly stayed away from controversy, apart from a contentious decision to award a corner in the build-up to Robinson’s own goal.

The win was the Cherries’ fourth in a row – and their fifth in six games – and lifts Andoni Iraloa’s side into the top half