Bournemouth's Joe Partington has urged his team-mates not to let this season finish with a whimper
Defender hopes Cherries' season doesn't finish with a whimper
Bournemouth's young defender Joe Partington has urged his team-mates not to let this season finish with a whimper after slipping down the table in recent weeks.
The Cherries were handily placed for automatic promotion before suffering three defeats on the bounce, including a 3-1 loss to fierce local rivals Southampton.
The South Coast club are now six points behind second-placed Huddersfield, but with a game in hand over the Terriers, and Wales Under 21 international Partington is convinced this season's rollercoaster ride has not finished yet.
"It has been an absolute rollercoaster for everyone involved over the past few years and we've kept the same group of lads together during that time, apart from the one or two which have moved to bigger things because they've been doing so well," Partington told
skysports.com.
Credit
"It is a credit to the team and the club that we stuck together after the points deduction and got out of the relegation zone before pushing on and gaining promotion the season after.
"We haven't looked back since and hopefully we can find another gear and finish the season strongly to secure promotion again this time round.
"It would be massive for us to go on and get into the Championship because no one knew what to expect at the start of the season.
"It only took us a few games to get the nerves out of the way and realise that we were good enough to compete at this level.
"From then on we have just kicked on, especially at home, and teams don't come to our place thinking they can have an easy ride because we don't give much away at home.
"We've proven that we can win games on the road too and it has been a great season overall so far.
"Hopefully we can get back to winning ways against Charlton on Saturday and use that to kick-start our promotion push again."
