AFC Bournemouth won their first game of the season with a comfortable victory over Wolves at Dean Court yesterday afternoon, Marcus Tavernier’s early deflected strike enough to beat the toothless visitors.

There was much to take away from the first home game of the season, so here are five things we learned as the 90 minutes unfolded:

1. Tyler Adams is the heartbeat of this team

Every time I watch Tyler Adams play, I fall in love with him that little bit more. He is one of those players that if watching as a neutral, you probably wouldn’t pick him out as one of the star players of the team. But watching the man week in week out, you realise just how much better the team he is when he plays. He was the catalyst for the goal yesterday, winning the ball back from Jean-Ricner Bellegarde in the final third, the ball falling to Antoine Semenyo who picked out Tavernier for his goal. Besides his major role in the goal, Adams was exceptional, other than earning a silly yellow card. He completed 90% of his passes, wasn’t dispossessed, had six defensive contributions (blocks, tackles, interceptions), and won 4/7 of his ground duels. Even with the yellow card to his name, he did nothing silly to even the sides up. Another top display by a very consistent performer – have you ever seen Tyler drop anything less than a 7/10?

2. David Brooks has a big role to play this season

My article on David Brooks this week suggested that he might want to leave the club in order to play regularly, with only one year left on his deal. But yesterday’s performance might have shown that he doesn’t need to leave – he is more than good enough to play his part here. I truly believe that no one else would have found that through ball to Evanilson, which won the red card as Toni Gomes fouled the Brazilian who was through on goal. The pass was incisive, perfect, and Brooks was rightly praised by his teammates after the awarding of the red card. He should’ve had another assist too, his inch perfect cross in the first half was somehow not converted by Semenyo, whose close range effort smacked the bar. Brooks will have to fight for his place over the course of the season, but there is no reason he shouldn’t start against Spurs next week. His performances over the first two weeks have been very encouraging – and long may it continue.

3. Shooting problems continue

Perhaps not something we ‘learned’ yesterday, but a worrying trend that seems to have carried over from last season is the lack of cutting edge in front of goal. 14 shots yesterday, and just four on target, even the goal we did score only went in due to a deflection. The game should have been out of sight long before the final whistle – our woes in front of goal are not good for my health, please put games out of reach in the future AFC Bournemouth. The play up until the final third was so encouraging, even some touches in and around the area were fantastic, but the shooting boots were not on and it was a frustrating watch at times, no less in the 94th minute when with a four on three opportunity led by Junior Kroupi, we somehow managed not to get a shot away. There are going to be days where we absolutely blow teams out of the water, but if we don’t find that clinical nature in front of goal, there will lie some frustrating days ahead. Better teams will punish us for being so wasteful.

4. Amine Adli is a VERY exciting player

I had never watched Amine Adli play before, and only seen a few clips of him after he was signed. After watching his cameo yesterday, I am very, very excited about what the future holds for this man at our club. His appearance off the bench was electric, and you can see exactly why he was brought into the club – he epitomises everything Andoni Iraola is about. Despite only playing 24 minutes, he completed more dribbles (three) than anyone else in the match. His pace was frightening and he beat his man so easily, and also was very supportive of his new teammates, despite only joining up with them a few days ago, his animated personality shining through. Adli worked hard on the other end of the pitch too, making four defensive contributions and winning seven ground duels. It seems he will very quickly become a fan favourite, and I can’t wait to see more of him going forward (in the near future at least he will surely start against Brentford on Tuesday).

5. The defence looked much better as a unit

Last week at Anfield was never going to be easy, but the defending was not good enough, no matter who we were up against. That said, Bafode Diakite had come into the team after just a few days training in a new country, and after a week to gel with his new teammates and backline, everyone looked much more assured yesterday. Marcos Senesi was much improved (and deserves a lot of credit having received a fair bit of stick recently) next to him, with 14 defensive contributions; Diakite had 10 and won 3/3 tackles. Both were good on the ball as well, and were more than a match for the very physical Jorgen Strand Larsen. Djordje Petrovic didn’t have much to do, but he did what he did well, including a good save in the first half from the Wolves number 9. Adrien Truffert has looked right at home in his first two games, impressing yet again yesterday, he had four defensive contributions, four recoveries and wasn’t dribbled past. He looked threatening going forward, and seems to have developed a good understanding with his teammates already; his endless energy makes him the perfect Iraola left back. On the other side, Adam Smith had another very solid game, looking assured going both ways as he always does these days. A new centre back may come in soon, but the improvement from the backline was very encouraging.

All of that and I didn’t even need to mention my favourite player, Ryan Christie was back in action, as well as Justin Kluivert (not my favourite player, but great to have him back). A game of many positives, lots to improve on as well, but more importantly, the first win of the season in just the second game. It was a nice feeling to feel slightly disappointed only beating established Premier League opposition by one goal, a sign of just how good this team can be.

Onwards and upwards, UTCIAD.