Bournemouth took the extraordinary, gas guzzling decision to FLY to London for their Premier League match at Tottenham Hotspur, Daily Mail Sport understands.
The Cherries took to the skies for a 20-minute short-hop to City Airport, rather than opting for a more eco-friendly train or bus journey in a carbon heavy move which may well raise eyebrows among campaigners, other clubs and the league itself.
Bournemouth’s Vitality Stadium is a mere 113 miles from Spurs’s Tottenham Stadium and can be reached without traffic in around two-and-a-half-hours by road. Trains from Bournemouth to Waterloo take around one hour and 59 minutes.
However, the Cherries instead decided to fly to London, ahead of Saturday’s 1-0 victory which left them with two wins from their opening three games.
It now remains to be seen if they will repeat the trick for the six other top-flight matches they will have to play in the capital.
The decision would appear to be at odds with the Bournemouth’s own, seven-page sustainability policy, in which an entire section is dedicated to ‘Sustainable Transport’.
Bournemouth took the decision to fly to London for their Premier League match at Tottenham
The Cherries opted against for a more eco-friendly train or bus journey to the capital
Within the section, the club pledge to ‘develop a domestic travel policy that reduces reliance on air travel, considering sustainability, performance, and logistics’.
It adds that it will ‘expand low-carbon travel options for fans (e.g. coach travel, public transport info)’ and look to introduce a Cycle to Work and Car Share scheme for employees. It would appear that there is a different stance towards manager Andoni Iraola and his players.
Bournemouth have been contacted for comment.
In March of this year, the Premier League launched an Environmental Sustainability Strategy, which it said ‘reaffirmed its commitment to addressing environmental issues and building on existing work to support long-term change’.
The strategy has three priority areas including ‘future-proofing the game by supporting decarbonisation across the Premier League’.
Bournemouth declined to comment. It is thought the club were keen to maximise the time the manager had available to work with players between matches. They had played at home to Brentford in the Carabao Cup on Tuesday night.
