After his hat-trick heroics against West Ham United on Saturday, AFC Bournemouth striker Josh King has said that he is “loving life” down on the south coast.

Scoring seven goals in his last five Premier League appearances the 25-year-old is in fine form for Eddie Howe’s side, despite his team struggling this year until recent weeks.

Saturday’s win was the first victory for the Cherries in 2017 in fact, and Josh King said he couldn’t “describe how important the win is. We have been struggling in 2017 but this is great to get three points.”

King could have had more

The young Norwegian managed to grab a three goal haul despite missing a first half penalty too, a miss which he admitted he was “fuming” about.

He added that he “could have had four or five if I hadn’t missed the penalty but I am just happy to help the team and get the three points. After a good result at Manchester United, there has been a buzz around the training ground and I just had a feeling it was going to be good. We had to work hard for it but I knew we would win.”

He certainly made up for that miss with his first goal too, a wonderfully audacious effort that saw him flick the ball over José Fonte with his right peg and then ping the ball into the bottom corner with his left foot. His next two goals saw him in exactly the right place at the right time, demonstrating his constantly improving instincts as a striker.

King also admitted he is enjoying the challenge of being AFC Bournemouth’s main source of goals, with Callum Wilson injured for the rest of the campaign and Benik Afobe not taking his chances when they arise.

Working with Howe a pleasure

He said that working with Eddie Howe is a pleasure too, admitting that he’s “learning so much from the gaffer and the lads and to be honest I'm loving it at the moment.”

His affection for his teammates was also evident when he said what he was doing with the match ball - revealing that “the match ball is in the dressing room getting signed by the lads - I couldn't do it without them so I wanted their names on it for memory.”

This kind of level headed approach to football is something that much of the AFC Bournemouth squad seem to possess, with nobody bigger than the team.

And in no better way is this demonstrated by Josh King’s answer when asked if he would be celebrating his hat-trick in the evening: “No I won’t be celebrating – we have got an important game next week so it’s back to fatherhood for me tonight."

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