Ian Evatt believes Wanderers can learn from some of the best in the business as they aim to show their own talents at Arsenal, writes Pete Oliver.
Evatt’s men take on the Premier League heavyweights in a third-round Carabao Cup tie on Wednesday night.
The Whites will have to become the first side to beat the Gunners this season if they are to pull off a major shock at the Emirates Stadium.
But regardless of the size of the task in front of them, Evatt wants to make it a memorable occasion as the two clubs meet for the first time since a top-flight encounter in 2012.
“It's something we can all enjoy off the back of a good performance on Saturday,” said the Wanderers’ boss, who masterminded a 5-2 victory over Reading at the weekend to give the Whites a first League One win of the campaign.
“We can go there with the pressure off and just know this is as tough as it gets and go there humble enough to know that there is zero expectation and no-one thinks we've got a cat in hell’s chance.
“But what we can do is go and learn about what it takes to be either a manager or a player at that level. We will go there and give it our best shot and see where that takes us. We are going to do our best to be competitive and hopefully we can make it an enjoyable experience, not just for us but for our supporters who are going down in their numbers again.
“The only way they will enjoy it is if we give them a game and we are capable of doing that, I have no doubt about that. Are we capable of winning? Probably not, but we are capable of being competitive and showing flashes and glimpses of what we are and who we are as a team right now. We’re looking forward to it and hopefully the players can go there and execute a good performance.”
Wanderers are set to backed by over 4,000 travelling fans in north London as they try and upset an Arsenal side which has twice won the League Cup before and this season will be focused on trying to end a 20-year wait to win the Premier League title.
Mikel Arteta’s star-studded side – which was only minutes away from holding on with 10 men to beat defending champions Manchester City on Sunday – enter the competition at the third-round stage, while Wanderers have knocked out Mansfield Town and Shrewsbury to set up their big night and the chance to try and reach round four for the first time since 2012 when they lost to the Gunners.
However, with the trip to the Emirates the first of three successive away games for Wanderers – and with a vital game at Crawley Town to follow less than 72 hours later – Evatt will have to box clever to meet two vastly contrasting challenges.
“We've won two cup games to enable us to have this opportunity to go to Arsenal and give everyone a great night and a great experience and for the club to make and have some significant finance off the back of it. We have had to earn the right to do that, which we've done, and now it's down to us to go and enjoy it and show them what we can do,” he told Wanderers TV.
“We want to go there and be effective, be aggressive, be intense and play the way that we play. We need to maybe tweak one or two things but take it to them and be the best version of ourselves and see how far that takes us.
“Everybody will want to play, I have no doubt about that. But we know what's more important. Again, that's no disrespect to the competition or Arsenal but Crawley on Saturday is a more important game for us.
“There will be some rotation. We need energy. We are at our best when we play with energy and we saw that, in particular in the first half on Saturday, that we're hard to stop when we play with that energy intensity and aggression.”
Watch the manager’s full pre-match interview on Wanderers TV HERE