Phil Sumbler
Bournemouth and the Swans will lock horns tomorrow for the second time this season but Cherries boss Andoni Iraola is expecting a different challenge to the one they faced in the Carabao Cup earlier on this season.
On that occasion a stoppage time goal saw Bournemouth run out 3-2 winners at the Swansea.com Stadium but that was in the early stages of the Michael Duff reign – a reign that we can now describe as “short”.
Since that time the Swans have changed managers and will go to the South Coast tomorrow looking for our own progression to the fifth round of the competition under new manager Luke Williams. And it is that presence of Williams that Iraola believes will make for differences in the approach and style of the Swans compared to the one that they beat here back at the end of August.
Iraola was looking ahead to Thursday’s clash with his press conference but also recognised that they saw this as an opportunity to progress in the competition especially for a club who have only reached the fifth round on five previous occasions in the competition.
He also wanted his side to cut out the mistakes that they saw in the third round against QPR where they had to reverse a 2-0 half-time deficit to run out 3-2 winners against the Championship side.
“You want to progress in every cup game and I think it’s a good opportunity for us,” saod Iraola.
“But as we saw against QPR with two mistakes in two minutes, this can happen anytime you go on the pitch and you are almost out of the competition.
“We know Swansea from the Carabao Cup but we are facing a team which has changed manager and they have changed their style a little bit.
“It’s not going to be easy for us to prepare for the game because they have different tactical approaches.
“We haven’t had a lot of time to prepare and we have to be very ready because I think, tactically, it will be a very demanding game for us.”
