Bournemouth will face West Bromwich Albion in the FA Cup and Iraola does not think it will be an easy game

The "Cherries" Bournemouth will host West Bromwich Albion from the Championship in the third round of the 2024/25 FA Cup. Coach Andoni Iraola said that West Bromwich Albion is a well-trained team, so he urged his players to give their best performance to cope with this challenge.

In the last round of the Premier League, Bournemouth relied on David Brooks to score and finally defeated Everton 1-0 at home, and successfully used a victory to prepare for the FA Cup challenge.

It is worth mentioning that Bournemouth has achieved 1 win, 2 draws and 2 losses in the last 5 matches against West Bromwich Albion. Bournemouth coach Andoni Iraola said, "This may not be the first game the team wants to face in the FA Cup. They are a team in the promotion play-off position in the English Championship."

"I know their previous manager Carlos Corberan very well and I think they will continue with the style of the original coaching staff, and they are a well-trained team. I think it will also pose a good challenge to us tactically, and I hope we are ready because it will be a difficult game. In the past two seasons, we have been eliminated at home by the top teams in the Championship, so this will be a similar situation, so we must be ready."

Andoni Iraola also said, "We hope to advance to the next round, but we are also aware that this will be a close game and we must give our best performance and strive to show the gap between the two leagues."

In addition, Bournemouth has faced a lot of injury problems recently, including Evanilson and Enes Unard who are unable to play.

When asked if he would field a different line-up, Andoni Iraola said: "The problem is that we don't have enough players to make large-scale changes because we only have so many players. So I don't have many options, and we also have to consider two consecutive away Premier League games next week. The games next week will be very difficult and we have to use the players very carefully."

"We have to field a good starting XI and send good substitutes because we don't have many options. This is a cup game and there are special characteristics to such games. If you are behind, you have to take risks and if the opponent is behind, they have to take risks too."