Eddie Howe explained Bournemouth feel fortunate to have signed David Brooks after his double defeated Brighton and Hove Albion, ending a dismal run of form.
Bournemouth recorded a 2-0 home victory on Saturday having lost seven of their previous eight matches, with Brighton seeing Lewis Dunk sent off for a second yellow card 17 minutes from time.
Brooks, 21, netted fine efforts after 21 and 77 minutes to get his side's campaign back on track, and Howe revealed they may not have been able to sign the midfielder from Sheffield United had he not suffered with illness towards the end of last season.
"We liked him a lot from watching him at Sheffield United," Howe said of the Wales international, who cost a reported £11.5million in July.
"He had glandular fever at the end of last season and that was probably the reason we were able to sign him as if he'd stayed fit and kept playing he might have gone beyond us [to a bigger club].
"Two great goals from David, both totally different but he showed his quality in both moments.
"We've been pleasantly surprised [by him] - we knew we were getting a very technical and intelligent player, but he really buys into the team ethic and has a tactical understanding of how the team plays, and an ability to handle the Premier League, not getting carried away with his early season success.
"The recent run we've been on has been tough, at 1-0 the game's still in the balance but we stood firm. Hopefully that sets us up nicely for the Christmas period as we've got two matches now [against Tottenham and Manchester United] where we can really attack."
Merry Christmas // December 22, 2018
Brighton's Chris Hughton was disappointed with his team's defending for the goals, as he otherwise felt they had Bournemouth under control.
"You're always going to look at goals you concede and there will be aspects of it you're disappointed with," he said after a third straight defeat, which left Brighton in 13th, still nine points clear of the bottom three.
"He [Brooks] is a left-footed player and the last thing you want to do is to show him onto his left side and give him opportunities.
"That's the margins, on chances we probably had more efforts on target but there wasn't a lot between the opportunities we had and they had. It's about who puts them away - unfortunately, they did and we didn't.
"We were always in the game, it became difficult when we were down to 10 men with the pace Bournemouth have. But apart from the goals, we dealt with them well."
