Swans happy to put the bite on Tottenham as Cup underdogs
CARLOS Carvalhal will send Swansea City out for their FA Cup quarter-final clash with Tottenham with the message that his underdogs have nothing to lose as they chase their Wembley dream against their heavily-fancied opponents.
The in-form Swans have home advantage as they look to advance to the last four of the famous knock-out tournament for just the third time in their history.
But standing in their way are a Spurs side who have lost just one of their last 19 games in all competitions, and possess any number of attacking threats despite the injuryenforced absence of England striker Harry Kane.
The Swans have absentees of their own, with Jordan Ayew suspended and January recruits Andre Ayew and Andy King cup-tied.
All of which means the hosts will start as underdogs despite losing just two of Carvalhal’s 16 games at the helm.
But the Portuguese is happy to embrace that status in this “David v Goliath” encounter, and insists it is Tottenham who have far more to lose with the pressure on Mauricio Pochettino’s man to garner some silverware.
“I agree with this, and Tottenham know this also,” he said when asked if his side had little to lose compared to their visitors.
“They go into every competition to try to win, whether it is the Carabao Cup, the Premier League, the Champions League or the FA Cup.
“If they will not win the Carabao Cup, if they are out of the Champions League and they will not win the Premier League, they have one trophy left.
“So they will put everything on the cup, we know that and because of that the pressure will be much more on their side.
“But we start the game 11 v 11 and this is the beauty of football. The best team on the day will win and we want to help people to follow their dreams.”
Swansea’s last home defeat was actually against Spurs at the start of January.
Fernando Llorente, the former Swansea striker, and Dele Alli scored in a controversial 2-0 win.
It was the only time Carvalhal has tasted defeat at home since his December appointment and one he insists would not have happened had the Video Assistant Referee system been in operation.
Carvalhal said: “There was a clear offside and, with VAR, we stay level
in that game and with a strong commitment we can win.
“With VAR we would not lose that game, and now we have an opportunity to go to the semi-final.
“But we are in a better moment than when we played them in the league.
“Now I think we could say we have a 30 per cent chance compared to maybe 10 per cent before.
“We will do our best to explore the same very weak points they have and cover the many strong points they have.”
Swansea’s hopes of producing an upset in their first FA Cup quarterfinal for 54 years have been boosted by the absence of Kane, who has scored 35 goals this season.
England striker Kane damaged ankle ligaments at Bournemouth last weekend and is expected to be out until next month as he battles to be fit for England’ World Cup campaign.
But Carvalhal said: “In the last game he (Kane) was playing they were losing 1-0 when he came out, but they win 4-1.
“Kane is fantastic and I like him a lot. But at big teams, players can replace big players.
“We don’t have Andre Ayew, Jordan Ayew, Renato Sanches, Leroy Fer, Andy King or Wilfried Bony and that makes a big difference for us.
“But all their players are international players, they are big players.”