Bournemouth face Wolves in an all Premier League contest in the fifth round of the 2024-25 FA Cup.
Victory would see Bournemouth reach the Quarter-Finals for the first time since 2020-21 season, whilst Wolves seek consecutive Quarter-Final appearances for the first time since 1993-94 & 94-95 seasons.
Team News
Ryan Christie is very unlikely to be available for Bournemouth after he suffered a groin injury in their league loss at Brighton in midweek.
Julian Araujo (hamstring) has been cleared to resume first-team training but it is thought that Andoni Iraola won’t risk him in this game.
Illya Zabarnyi (suspension), Adam Smith (calf), Marcos Senesi (muscle) and Enes Unal (ACL) remain absent.
Wolves have no fresh injury concerns to report following their midweek loss to Fulham.
Emmanuel Agbadou, Hee-Chan Hwang (both hamstring), Rodrigo Gomes (unspecified), Goncalo Guedes, Yerson Mosquera (both knee), Leon Chiwone, Sasa Kalajdzic and Enso Gonzalez (all ACL) remain sidelined.
When is Kick-Off?
Bournemouth host Wolves at the Vitality Stadium on Saturday 1 March at 3pm GMT, untelevised live in the UK.
Stat Attack
- Bournemouth have won one of their two previous FA Cup ties against Wolves (W1, L1).
- Wolves won 2-1 on their only previous FA Cup visit to Bournemouth in January 1948.
- This is Bournemouth’s first FA Cup tie against Wolves since the Cherries dropped ‘… and Boscombe Athletic’ from their name.
- Antoine Semenyo and Daniel Jebbison have both scored in each of Bournemouth’s two FA Cup matches this season (W2).
- All four of Wolves’ FA Cup goals this season came in the first half.
Prediction
Having lacked their cutting edge in their league meeting against Wolves last weekend, Bournemouth certainly need to be much sharper if want to drop their surprising dip in performance which continued with a loss at Brighton, as they really have a great chance at going deep in this season’s competition with their quality.
Wolves though are currently five points clear of the Premier League relegation zone and although survival is their main priority, they can afford to go bold and try to get deeper in this competition especially with their strong line-ups in the two previous rounds now paying dividends in terms of form.
I however do feel that Bournemouth should bounce back if they’ve learned from last weekend’s frustrations but Wolves won’t make this easy by any stretch.
Prediction: Bournemouth 2-1 Wolves
Result: Bournemouth 1-1 Wolves (Bournemouth win 5-4 on penalties)