Dean Smith: Aston Villa won't sit on lead at West Brom
Dean Smith has promised no holding back from Villa as they look to book their place at Wembley in tonight’s Championship play-off semi-final second leg against Albion.
Villa hold a narrow advantage in the tie but Smith does not want his team to invite pressure from the hosts.
Smith admitted he would be ‘amazed’ if the Baggies did not now go on the offensive, after adopting a defensive approach in Saturday’s first leg.
And he wants his own players to stick with the methods which has seen them win 11 of their last 13 matches.
Asked if it would be difficult to retain an attacking mindset due to being ahead in the tie, Smith replied: “No, not really. Our mindset for the last 14 games has been to go into it and try to win. We’ve been very good at that, and we’re getting used to winning too, which is important.
“The players know my mindset, I think if you go and sit back you invite a lot of pressure on your goal, and I’m not comfortable with that.
“The quality of the players we’ve got, we can score a lot of goals, so you’ve got to utilise that.
“I’ll be amazed if they’re not different. I wouldn’t expect a Hawthorns crowd to be happy with them sat behind the ball and to let us have a lot of possession. I expect a different game to Saturday, that’s for sure.”
Villa fought back to claim their one-goal advantage on Saturday after Dwight Gayle had opened the scoring for Albion.
Smith said: “This team has a way of winning and they never give up.”
