Bournemouth manger Kevin Bond blamed a combination of poor defending and dreadful decision making for his side's 4-1 home defeat to Southend.The Shrimpers went ahead in the 18th minute when a shot from Simon Francis was parried by goalkeeper Gareth Stewart into the path of Mark Gower to score.

Francis himself scored the second in the 23rd minute before Tommy Black and Gary Hooper added to Bournemouth's misery by completing the rout.

"Our defending and decision making was dreadful," said Bond. "I am not going to isolate or pick on any individual but our centre-halves had a poor day and our goalkeeper was disappointed with a couple of goals.

"Southend scored with their first shot on target and at half-time they have scored with all three attempts they had yet we had some unbelievably good chances and did not take any of them.

"It destroys you when you are doing all right and then suddenly you are 2-0 down. I always felt we had a goal in us but it is demoralising when you have a host of chances and manage to take only one. I expected better from my experienced players."

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