Junior Stanislas interview: Unlikely hero lighting up Bournemouth

Junior Stanislas couldn’t break into Eddie Howe’s promoted team last season – but has been key to his side’s recent fine form. He tells Jack Pitt-Brooke how hard he worked in the summer and how he hopes United are on receiving end today

Junior Stanislas (RUSSELL SACH)

One thing is very clear at Bournemouth: they believe in themselves. Everything that Eddie Howe has achieved at the club owes to looking up rather than down, to ambition and optimism, aiming beyond what is expected rather than within it. But sometimes in football you just need a spark.

Two weeks ago they went into the home game against Everton having not won in the league in the previous eight matches. With 10 minutes left they were 2-0 down. They needed a player to realise that ethos, and turn the game.

Enter Junior Stanislas, an unlikely hero. The 26-year-old scored the second and third goals in that Everton game to steal the most dramatic draw of the season. Then, in the next match, Stanislas whipped in the corner which Glenn Murray converted for Bournemouth’s historic win at Chelsea. Suddenly hope is back at Bournemouth, who tonight host Manchester United knowing that if they play like they can, like they did last Saturday, they can certainly beat Louis van Gaal’s struggling side.

And yet Stanislas is a slightly surprising catalyst. He is not one of the core players who have travelled up through the leagues with Howe. He arrived in summer 2014 but was only ever on the fringes last year. He admits that he did not feel fully part of May’s Championship promotion celebrations. When Max Gradel arrived from St Etienne for £7million, Stanislas looked to be even further away from this year’s first team.

But here he is, Bournemouth’s form player, with four starts in a row, reflecting on his part in Chelsea’s downfall and his own plans for Manchester United. “Straight after Chelsea was an unbelievable feeling, one to share with family and friends,” he says when we meet up after training at the club’s Dean Court stadium this week. “But when we got back on Monday, it was all about preparing for United this weekend.”

There are teams who would hope in games like this just to get out alive, to conserve resources for more realistic challenges. But that is not what Bournemouth did last Saturday and not what they will do today.

“A lot of people talk about the big teams as throwaway games, where if you get something, great, but if you don’t, it doesn’t really matter,” says Stanislas. “But every game matters for us. We always want to go out and play our football. We always look to win. That is what we will be looking to do this weekend as well.”

There is no doubt that Bournemouth are up against it. Only goal difference currently keeps them out of the bottom three. But they will not be shaken from their positive ethos. Some of the bigger sides around Bournemouth look terrified of relegation. But when you have come from nowhere, what is there to be scared of?

“When you are near the bottom of the league, if you are thinking about the games coming thick and fast in a negative way, then you have already lost those games,” Stanislas says. “We are looking forward to our games, going out and winning them, climbing up the league. When you start dreading games, there is only going to be one outcome.”

Stanislas speaks like an enthusiastic devotee of Howe, his methods, and what he has built here. Stanislas and Howe are very close, Howe having signed the 21-year-old for Burnley from West Ham United over four years ago. But at Bournemouth, Stanislas is still finding his way.

Last season’s promotion from the Championship was one of the great achievements of recent years but Stanislas speaks honestly about how he could not feel fully part of it. He was not 100 per cent fit when he arrived, after hamstring trouble in the summer. He struggled to win his place in the team. He only started six league games all season. He has already started that many in the Premier League.

“It was difficult,” Stanislas admits. “Everything comes back to playing. If you’re not going to play, then there is no point in you being there. It was very difficult. The team was winning pretty much every game. I understood it from the manager’s point of view. I just had to see out the season.”

So as Bournemouth went on those great runs – 36 points from 42 in autumn, 30 from 36 in spring – Stanislas was on the bench. “It is so frustrating,” he explains. “The boys are doing well, and you’re happy for them. But at the same time, you are part of it, but you don’t really feel part of it. Friends and family ask why you’re not playing, you have to explain why. It is really hard watching people do what you want to be doing. But at the end of the day, you support them.”

When the triumphant Bournemouth squad rode their open top bus along the seafront, in front of thousands of fans, Stanislas had to make himself feel part of it. “Initially, I didn’t really [feel part of it],” he says. “But then I thought to myself, ‘I’m part of the squad, I have to get involved.’ I didn’t feel overwhelmed and overjoyed individually, because I hadn’t played much of the season. But I tried to make myself a part of it, and the boys were brilliant.”

But it was that frustration, and ambiguity of feeling, that forced Stanislas to make sure that did not happen this year. He could have looked elsewhere this summer, but decided to stay and fight for his place, working harder than ever to do so.

After growing up on the Ferrier Estate in Kidbrooke, a tough part of south-east London, Stanislas is used to fighting to better himself.

“After the season I just had, I didn’t want the same season again this year,” he says. “You have got time off, you can go away and do anything. But you’ve got to be disciplined in what you do. I went away and worked hard through the summer.” Stanislas stayed at his family home in south east London, and did box to box running in Sutcliffe Park. When he returned to Dorset, he came in to work with the fitness team, running around the fields next to the ground.

Junior Stanislas (GETTY IMAGES)

Bournemouth spent £7m on Cote d’Ivoire international Gradel, one of the top players in France, but Stanislas did not let that faze him either. “It was just more competition, really,” he says. “I believe in myself, I know what I can do when I’m fit. It was just a case of getting back in, getting in his face, and giving myself the best possible chance.”

That is exactly what Stanislas has done and he is now enjoying the best spell of his career so far. First-team football, after all, is why Stanislas joined Bournemouth in the first place. He left Burnley after they were promoted in 2014, turning down a contract in the Premier League, because he had been on the sidelines for their promotion season too, starting seven Championship games for Shaun Dyche’s side.

It was Howe who signed Stanislas for Burnley, when first-team opportunities at West Ham were limited under Sam Allardyce. Howe made an instant impression on Stanislas with his enthusiasm and people skills. Four years later, Howe called again to get Stanislas out of Burnley and down to the south coast. It was an easy decision. “I thought Eddie could get the best out of me,” Stanislas says. “Obviously he has this year.”