Bournemouth boss Eddie Howe defended his line-up for their FA Cup win at Portsmouth.

The arrival of Matt Ritchie and Marc Pugh on the hour and Joshua King's switch through the middle spared Bournemouth's blushes at Fratton Park.

King and Pugh found the net to cancel out Gary Roberts' first-half goal for hugely-impressive League Two men Portsmouth.

"It's always a risk, you don't know what the outcome's going to be," said Howe when asked if his selection was a gamble.

"But I believe that the players, when you look at them individually, are all very good players.

"They've all done it at a very good level, so I had no hesitation in making the changes.

"We absolutely trust all our players and need to give them chances.

"And we need them to be fit, this was a great opportunity to get them games so they are still ready to go in the Premier League.

"It was a very tough game, we expected it, we knew it was going to come.

"Credit to Portsmouth they were very good, they passed the ball, they pressed us. We didn't get into any rhythm, and it took us really to get the two subs on to get control of the game.

"But once we did we were very good until the end of the game."