T\u2019S NOT often Stoke City\u2019s and Barcelona\u2019s styles are mentioned in the same sentence. But Swansea City boss Michael Laudrup insists he has as much respect for Stoke\u2019s direct approach as Barcelona\u2019s famous tiki-taka.<\/p>\n
Former Nou Camp legend Laudrup makes his first visit to the Britannia Stadium tomorrow and while Stoke\u2019s tactics may be a world away from the elegant style with which Laudrup made his name, the Swans boss has refused to criticise Stoke\u2019s tough-tackling approach.<\/p>\n
Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger famously compared Stoke\u2019s style of play to a rugby team\u2019s after seeing his slick-passing side bullied by Pulis\u2019 men on a number of occasions in recent years.<\/p>\n
But while Laudrup admits Pulis\u2019 team of giants present a unique challenge for his stylish Swans, the 48-year-old says he would never judge another side\u2019s system.<\/p>\n
Laudrup said: \u201cThere is no-one like Stoke in Spain, it\u2019s very different. Even if they have players of the same size they do not play that way but that does not make it the wrong way to play.<\/p>\n
\u201cI respect Stoke for the way they play as much as I respect Barcelona for the way they play.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can all have the way we want to play but there are lots of ways to win games.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will never be the one to say \u2018I don\u2019t like their style\u2019 because that is not me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Swansea were stung by two set-piece goals at the Britannia in the same fixture last season with Peter Crouch and Matthew Upson making the most of their physical advantage to sink Brendan Rodgers\u2019 side.<\/p>\n
With only Ashley Williams,Ki Sung-Yeung,Danny Graham\u00a0and new signings Chico Flores and Miguel Michu above 6ft in Laudrup\u2019s squad they face a huge challenge to stop the likes of 6ft 7in Crouch and company. Laudrup had expressed his disappointment at the number of free kicks and corners Swansea conceded in their 3-0 mauling at the hands of Everton last weekend which directly led to two of the Toffees\u2019 three goals.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s warned his side they cannot make the same mistake at the Britannia or they risk playing straight into Stoke\u2019s hands.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey have a very physical team and set pieces are a very big part of football these days,\u201d said Laudrup.<\/p>\n
\u201cStoke rely on their set-pieces and we certainly can\u2019t give eight or nine free kicks away in the first 10 minutes again.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody knows about their direct style of play and of course, they scored from two set pieces last season.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut some times it\u2019s impossible to avoid set pieces. You can talk about free kicks but we still want to be aggressive in our pressure, it\u2019s more about the way we defend.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s still only one ball so if we play it around they can\u2019t hurt us.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have to pay attention and not give them free headers, and when we have the ball we have to make sure that we use it.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have to take chances, but they will be calculated in whatever we do.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
T\u2019S NOT often Stoke City\u2019s and Barcelona\u2019s styles are mentioned in the same sentence. But Swansea City boss Michael Laudrup insists he has as much respect for Stoke\u2019s direct approach as Barcelona\u2019s famous tiki-taka. Former Nou Camp legend Laudrup makes his first visit to the Britannia Stadium tomorrow and while Stoke\u2019s tactics may be a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":453,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/453"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18949"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18949\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}