Bournemouth in pinch-me territory as another underdog success story in English soccer

Held aloft by Bournemouth supporters at one end of the club’s cozy, 12,000-seat stadium was a giant tifo that posed a simple question: “How did we end up here?”

Their team was about to play AC Milan, one of the most famous names in world soccer, in the Europa League and cruise to a 3-0 win. Three days later, it would steamroll Manchester United — another global superpower — by the same score in the Premier League.

Indeed, these are pinch-me times for fans of a team from England’s south coast which was playing in the second-tier Championship just five years ago and, 18 years ago, went into bankruptcy protection, leading to demotion to the bottom tier of the English Football League.

That year — the 2007-08 season — Milan started out as the Champions League titleholder and Man United finished it by winning Europe's biggest club trophy.

Bournemouth? It was on its knees, barely able to survive.

How different things are now.

The Cherries are owned by U.S. billionaire Bill Foley, have a raft of top international talent in its squad including U.S. captainTyler Adams, and have just finished in their highest ever end-of-season position — sixth place in the Premier League — to qualify for European competition for the first time.

In almost every transfer window Bournemouth’s best players are typically poached by the heavyweights of the European game, like Dean Huijsen going to Real Madrid, Illia Zabarnyi moving to Paris Saint-Germain and star winger Antoine Semenyo signing for Manchester City. Even its previous manager, Andoni Iraola, left to join Liverpool during the last offseason.

Yet so well-run is the club and so astute is its recruitment team — much like another upwardly mobile south-coast club, Brighton — that it isn’t turning out to be a problem.

OK, this season started slowly in the Premier League, with Bournemouth not winning any of its first six matches under newly appointed coach Marco Rose — chiefly because good performances were undermined by letting in sloppy late goals.

But the team has just had five straight wins, culminating in a magical past week containing the Milan-United double that would have had dyed-in-the-wool Bournemouth fans rubbing their eyes in disbelief and then Wednesday's 3-0 win over Aston Villa — one of England's Champions League entrants this season.

“It feels at the moment that we are in a flow but it is hard work — that’s what we have to know and we have to continue the hard work to stay in it," Rose said.

Sitting in 13th place in the 20-team Premier League but clearly with sky-high confidence, Bournemouth next faces Leeds at home on Saturday and has a benign run of games coming up, after its tough schedule to start the season.

France Under-21 star Eli Junior Kroupi, the team's biggest young talent and possibly its next big money sale, is fit again after a three-month layoff with a foot injury. Rayan, an imposing 20-year-old winger and another potential superstar-in-the-making, joined from Vasco da Gama only in January but is already in the Brazil squad and is a fearsome opponent to handle. Portugal defender Antonio Silva, signed from Benfica in the summer, is settling in nicely. Brazilian striker Evanilson has hit form with goals in four of his last five games.

No wonder Rose has high expectations.

“I want to win every game and we want to be competitive in every competition,” said the coach who has managed two of Germany's biggest clubs — Borussia Dortmund and Leipzig.

Win the Europa League — just like English clubs Tottenham and Aston Villa have done the past two seasons — and Bournemouth will be in the Champions League next year, marking the next extraordinary chapter in its rise from the depths of English soccer.

Manchester City, which is continuing to play under a cloud after being found guilty of large-scale financial rule-breaking, and Arsenal are tied on points at the top of the standings and both have tough games in the ninth round.

City hosts Brighton on Saturday — a repeat of their English League Cup meeting on Wednesday, won by City on penalties — and Arsenal visits Liverpool in Sunday's only match.

Under-fire Michael Carrick appears to be in charge of Manchester United only on a match-by-match basis after back-to-back heavy losses to Como in the Champions League and Bournemouth in the league. Next up for United is Chelsea away on Saturday.

Erling Haaland was rested by Man City for the cup in midweek, so will be fresh as he continues to chase history. Haaland has scored in each of his last seven league games, meaning he is closing in on Jamie Vardy's record of scoring in 11 consecutive matches for Leicester in the 2015-16 season.

Chelsea striker Joao Pedro is out for several weeks with a thigh injury and that's a problem for manager Xabi Alonso. The Brazil international has missed two games this season and Chelsea lost both and didn't score in either of them.

Man United might be missing its leading specialist striker for longer. There has been no confirmation from the club but reports in the English media, including the BBC, say Benjamin Sesko is expected to be out until at least January with a shin injury. He hasn't played since mid-September.

See AP’s full soccer coverage here

Bournemouth's Evanilson, right, celebrates scoring their side's second goal of the game during the Premier League match between Bournemouth and Sunderland, in Bournemouth, England Sunday Oct. 18, 2026. (Andrew Matthews/Press Association via AP Images)

Bournemouth's head coach Marco Rose looks on at the end of the Europa League soccer match between Bournemouth and AC Milan in Bournemouth, England, Thursday, Oct. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

Bournemouth's Amine Adli, left, celebrates after scoring his side's third goal during the Europa League soccer match between Bournemouth and AC Milan in Bournemouth, England, Thursday, Oct. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

Bournemouth's Rayan celebrates scoring his side's first goal during the English Premier League soccer match between Manchester United and Bournemouth in Manchester, England, Sunday, Oct. 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Dave Thompson)

URDA, Spain (AP) — Spain's second high-speed rail disaster this year, in which one train struck another from behind, killing 69 people, has raised fresh concerns about the safety of the country's rail network ahead of a national election.

Search teams with sniffer dogs continued to look for victims on Thursday morning, a day after the collision in central Spain. Cranes helped shift the carriages as police and soldiers helped pick through the wreckage strewn down the gravel slope where at least three train carriages were tossed by the impact.

One more body was found overnight, taking the death toll to 69, according to the regional leader of Castilla La Mancha, Emiliano García-Page.

“Yesterday we experienced a catastrophe that without a doubt has left all of Spain in shock,” García-Page said.

García-Page said that a crane would lift a damaged carriage that had flipped over. He added that 50 people remained hospitalized. “Besides bodies, there are body parts that need to be identified,” García-Page said.

Spain’s government declared three days of mourning starting Thursday.

Spain’s high-speed rail network has been considered one of the nation’s crowning achievements. It is the world's second-largest, after China's. Until this year, it had not endured a deadly crash since coming into service over three decades ago.

The collision Wednesday morning that turned a sleepy stretch of rail lined by olive groves into a scene of carnage came just four weeks before the country votes in a national election.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez visited the crash site in the province of Toledo on Wednesday after regional authorities confirmed that more than 60 people had died and dozens more were being treated at hospitals.

In January, 46 people had died when one train jumped the track and slammed into the side of another going the opposite way in southern Spain.

Sánchez pledged an investigation into the latest collision and improvements to prevent another tragedy like the two that have shaken trust in a rail system that carried 45 million travelers last year, including millions of tourists.

“It is clear that we need to reinforce the safety of our train service to rebuild the trust in our high-speed rail,” Sánchez said. “It is not acceptable for a country like Spain to endure two high-speed train accidents in the same year.”

Both deadly crashes this year took place on the same rail line. Each involved a train operated by state-owned RENFE and another operated by privately owned IRYO. Spain liberalized its high-speed rail service in 2021, with the Italian IRYO starting service the following year.

Sánchez has weathered many crises since taking power in 2018, staying in office and winning reelection after the COVID-19 pandemic and the global rise in inflation.

But polls show he faces another uphill battle when voters cast ballots in Spain's first national election since 2023. The new rail disaster can't help the prospects of his Socialist party.

Sánchez and other progressive parties had hoped to leverage a wave of discontent over housing costs and high rents when he called for early elections earlier this month.

About an hour before news of Wednesday's crash spread, Sánchez had posted on X a message that “There are lots of reasons to be optimistic about this country.”

He now faces questions about the safety of Spain's rail service along with criticism from right-wing parties of his liberal migration policies and accusations of corruption against his party and his wife, which both he and his wife deny.

His transport minister, Óscar Puente, faced media questions over whether he would resign following a second major train wreck under his watch. He said he was fully focused on dealing with the collision, not his future.

Sánchez's main rival, Popular Party leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo, demanded a full investigation of the crash on Wednesday. The conservative leader said that in respect for the victims his party canceled its campaign events for the day.

“This is the moment to respect the dead, the injured and their families,” Núñez Feijóo said. “That does not mean we will ignore the fact that Spaniards are asking tough questions that demand answers.”

The far-right Vox leader, Santiago Abascal, who is likely hoping to enter a coalition government with the conservatives, did not show the same restraint.

“More dead. Another tragedy. More rage over being left to fend for ourselves, the despair and the betrayal that Spaniards are enduring,” Abascal said just hours after the crash.

“I promise to work tirelessly until this government, which is a criminal organization, is sitting in a courtroom to answer for its crimes,” he said.

Puente said that the crash was caused by what he called the “inexplicable” order from a central command center for Spain’s trains after a security system had failed. He said the train engineers were not to blame.

Puente said that at 8:30 a.m. the security system on a stretch of 63 kilometers (39 miles) stopped working due to a computer malfunction, causing all trains on that stretch to stop. At that point the IRYO train was stopped near the town of Urda, while the RENFE train was 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) behind it.

But a few minutes later the central command told the RENFE train to start running again without any speed restrictions, and it ended up colliding with the stationary IRYO train at 8:53 a.m.

Puente said that the train should never have been told to start moving again since there was still a “stop signal” active on that line. And if it had, at least it should have been told to go at reduced speed.

Thousands of travelers were left stranded and searching for alternative transport after the high-speed line connecting Madrid and Seville was shut down. RENFE, which operates the most trains, is not selling tickets online for this service until mid-December.

Wilson reported from Barcelona, Spain. Associated Press writer Teresa Medrano in Madrid contributed to this report.

Emergency services work at the scene of a collision between two trains in Urda, Spain, on Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)

Emergency services work at the scene of a collision between two trains in Urda, Spain, on Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)

Emergency services work at the scene of a collision between two trains in Urda, Spain, on Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)

Cranes lift wrecked train carriages as rescuers search for victims following a collision between two trains in Urda, Spain, Thursday, Oct. 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)