Bournemouth 2-0 Stoke City: Cherries reach Carabao Cup fourth round

  • Published
  • comments
Dominic Solanke celebrates scoringImage source, Getty Images
Image caption,

Dominic Solanke is Bournemouth's top scorer with four goals this season

Bournemouth saw off Championship strugglers Stoke City to reach the Carabao Cup fourth round.

Second-half goals from Dominic Solanke and Joe Rothwell gave the Cherries their first home win under Andoni Iraola.

Solanke found the bottom corner from Adam Smith's cross, before Rothwell netted direct from a free-kick three minutes later.

The Cherries, who are yet to win in the Premier League this season, made eight changes from Sunday's defeat by Brighton.

After a goalless first half with few chances for either side, Iraola's half-time changes paid off with Solanke taking just six minutes to make an impact.

Smith's cross from the right picked out Solanke in the box, with the forward finding the bottom corner on the turn to take his tally to four goals this season.

Rothwell added a second three minutes later, picking out the far corner direct from a free-kick on the edge of the area.

Bournemouth are now in the last 16 of the competition for the second successive season. They will host Liverpool for the chance to reach the quarter-finals for the first time since the 2018-19 campaign.

Bournemouth boss Andoni Iraola: "Especially in a cup competition the most important thing at the end is to be in the next round. I think the game in the first half was not good from our side, the rhythm was not good enough to make a difference.

"We needed the change of energy attitude-wise at the beginning of the second half to make a difference."

Stoke manager Alex Neil: "I was encouraged the whole game, I just think it was two lapses. There was time for us to get the set-up right and make sure we don't concede but we just didn't deal with that well enough.

"I thought the organisation was good, the endeavour and effort was good, the passing and some of the movement was good. We just didn't really test the goalkeeper enough."

Sorry, we can't display this part of the article any more.