Former Carlisle-loanee Harry Arter spoke to the Daily Echo ahead of his current side's League One game against the Blues at Dean Court tomorrow, Arter first looking back on his time at Brunton Park:
“Greg Abbott helped me a lot when I was there and gave me a taste of playing the right way in League One. His budget is probably not as high as some of the other teams in this division but he always manages to get together a good side and they always compete. He has a good, young group of players this season, not dissimilar to what we had a couple of years ago.
“They will be trying to improve and get better and he will certainly have them playing the right way. It is their final away game of the season so they will want to end on a high. They haven’t got too much to play for and, sometimes, that relaxed approach to a game can be beneficial. We have got to make sure we are on our guard. We know what the end goal is for us and that should be all the motivation we need.”
“I haven’t seen their team recently but I am sure Greg will have strengthened it from when we played them earlier this season. They are playing away from home so I am sure they will have a different game plan and it will be a very different game to when we played them at their place. We can’t take them lightly. I know a few of their players who were there when I was there and they are good players. We must approach the game in the right way.”
Meanwhile Cherries defender Steve Cook commented to the Daily Echo:
“We have hit form at the perfect time of the season but nobody is getting carried away. We are in the thick of the promotion race and want to finish the job. When the manager took over with us fourth from bottom in October, not too many people would have expected us to be second in April. But we have been on a great run and have really shown what we are about. We have given ourselves a great chance of achieving something and everybody is determined to see it through.
“There is a cautious optimism in the camp but we are certainly not getting ahead of ourselves. The eyes of all Bournemouth supporters were on the result between Sheffield United and Brentford on Tuesday and a draw was probably what everybody wanted. It is up to us now to keep our side of the bargain. We have got two tough games left, starting with Carlisle on Saturday. Nobody is taking anything for granted. Carlisle upset the applecart when they went to Doncaster last week so we have got to make sure that doesn’t happen to us.
“There have been some unexpected results in the past few weeks, some of which have been to our advantage. We equalled the club record with a seventh win on the trot at Shrewsbury and are desperate to set a new one by making it eight against Carlisle. We just need to concentrate on ourselves and try to win our last two games. If we do that, everything else will take care of itself.”
In team news for the Cherries tomorrow they will be missing three players from their regular squad through injury in Miles Addison, Joe Partington and Stephen Purches. Centre-half Addison has been out since November with a foot injury which required surgery, while central midfielder Partington has also been on the operating table to repair a fractured fibula suffered two weeks ago. Finally comes versatile defender Purches who is still on the fitness comeback trail after breaking his own leg, in two places, 14 months ago.
The referee for tomorrow's match is Mick Russell from St Albans in Hertfordshire and he will be assisted down the lines by Simon Knapp from Bristol and Adam Matthews from Stroud in Gloucestershire. Meanwhile the fourth official is Mark Pottage from the Dorset version of Gillingham.