Albion will have just one day of training to prepare for their “once in a lifetime” chance to make Baggies history at Wembley, manager Tony Mowbray has revealed.
The Baggies’ Championship trip to Cardiff tomorrow means players will rest on Wednesday, meaning Thursday will be their only training day ahead of the meeting with Pompey on Saturday.
But Mowbray is still talking up his team’s chance of writing their own chapter in club history.
“If we get through Portsmouth this team will have a realistic chance of winning the FA Cup and in 100 years will be talked about as the team that won the Cup,” said Mowbray.
“We’re not belittling it in any way. We want to go there and give a really good account of ourselves because we want to win the trophy.
“A chance like that comes around once in a lifetime for most players.
“A slight frustration is that the preparation for playing a Premier League side at Wembley is going to be two days. And, with it being a 12.15pm kick-off, we’ll practically do nothing on Friday other than a warm-up and a bit of finishing before getting on the coach.
“So really we’ve got a one-day preparation to try to set the team up to play against a Premier League side at Wembley. The game at Cardiff was put in place before the last round of the FA Cup.”
And Mowbray admitted Saturday’s trip to the national Stadium will bring inevitable distractions, even though talk of the game has discouraged in the dressing room. “No-one is talking at our club about the FA Cup,” said Mowbray.
“But the obvious distraction is the players sorting out tickets for their family and transport for them. So, while we’re preparing for Cardiff, in the background the players are running around trying to sort things out.
“No-one is getting over-excited talking about the Portsmouth game and hopefully everyone is focused on the Cardiff game.
“If you’re going to go far in cup competitions you have to accept the consequences that certain league games will get pushed back.”
Mowbray was today finalising his team plans, not just for the trip to Cardiff but also for Wembley following an intense clash with Colchester at the weekend.
“I’ve blocked these games together in terms of teams I’m going to pick,” he said.
“Whether you like it or not as a coach, sometimes you have to think forwards and I have thought about who will play all three.”
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15 Comments
They should spend all of this week on HOW TO DEFEND CROSSES
and BASIC GOALKEEPING
For gods sake drop Dean Kieley(TMs BLUE EYED BOY!)
Good win for Wolves,it pains me to say it ,but they did what we should have done last week(win at Charlton)
Wake up Baggies !
albion are sure to freeze on the day and will probably start to play when its too late. it might be for the best if they dont let you get on the coaches again
2 MMDP.
We all know you’re a grade one plonker. No further confirmation required.
2. Don’t agree. Albion will take the game to Pompey. Thats how they play. It promises to be a high scoring entertaining cup game. Pompey have quality players and they are firm favourites for the cup, but Albion will go there and give them a game.
pompey do not have a striker defoe is cup tied and we have a real chance ,they have campbell,and james and we have keily and robbo mmmm!!!play danek against cardiff for gods sake!!
make my day punk,,,get back under your rock muppet.you are so full of jealousy its unbelievable we all like abit of banter mate but your just pure nasty.i hope albion achieve promotion and win the cup just to shut you up.if you spent as much time supporting wolves as you do knocking us they might achieve something.come on baggies do the double to shut the muppet up…DOING THE DOUBLE THE MOWBRAY WAY,,,IN STYLE OF COURSE,,,OH YES
Come on Pompey !!!!! and the Mighty Wolves of course
come on Pompey…and the mighty Wolves of course
Excuses already?!!
3 or 4 nil Portsmouth. It’s bottling time of year again Sandwell.
how i find this this so frustratin that we go into a semifinal of the fa cup with 1 day to prepair i mean to say i live up in scotland and travel to every home game round trip of 647miles ive seen the highs and the lows and belive me this is a real high this season but what i cant understand with the fa is why cant this game postponed weve had all the gripes of the big prem teams dont take this seriously but in scotland cup comes before league i think the fa cup should come first with the fixture any way were doing the double regardless of how many days to prepare see you at wembly 479+miles away but ill be there boing boing
NO 7, with the echo - just go and support your own team - jealousy will get you knowhere.
C’Mon boys
Boing Boing
come on you baggies i now you can do it xxx love pinky x
40 years i have waited to enjoy how it feels to win the cup. Lets do it again. Hey 7 bet you will cheer portsmouth on pity you have nothing to cheer with your bag of rubbish!! Albion till i die
14 steve. didnt you just scrape a very unconvicing win whilst conceeding 3 goals to the worse side in the division? wolves just won at charlton? a bag of rubbish i think not, as you will out when you come to molineux. your cup run is impressive but typical albion you will be out to the 1st premier opposition that you come up against. you are all talking wembley but you have been awful in the league and you will not go up.