Our Olle does his post match reflections and looks at the game yesterday against Coventry. In his words, Swansea took a swing at Goliath and got punished for it.

The game started well enough, both teams were going at it, and the Swans threatened Coventry. Tymon probably should’ve scored, but found the bar instead, and Coventry came right back at us. This type of game is entertaining to watch, and I appreciate the boys going for it early on, but realistically this type of game would always end up favouring the best offensive team in the league. Swansea could’ve taken the lead, but instead saw themselves punished in a twelve minute period that will go down as perhaps the worst of the season.

Mason-Clarke challenged Ben Cabango and ended up with a very cheap penalty that Thomas-Asante (who is chasing Zan Vipotnik at the top of the scoring charts) scored to make it 0-1. Although it was a very favourable call from the ref, Cabango should still be more careful inside of his own area.
The misery continued in a horror sequence I will never forget.

It starts with Burgess misplaying an easy pass, giving away possession in a dangerous area. Swansea reclaim the ball and it ends up with Eom on the byline, who refuses to clear it and instead loses the ball, it goes into the box where a shot is deflected, and it goes out to Matt Grimes who, upon his return to south Wales, volleys it home. This entire sequence was woeful and is reminiscent of problems in the past. Burgess just isn’t good enough with his feet, and I think he needs to be a rotational player next year. Eom’s decision making in that situation is catastrophic and it reminds me of goals conceded in the Martin era. And of course it’s Matt Grimes who fulfill the curse of former Swansea players scoring against us.

The suffering wouldn’t end though, as only a few minutes later another scrappy Coventry attack ends up with Sakamoto who’s shot, via deflection, finds the net and makes it 3 goals in twelve minutes for Coventry. The defending here was extremely lackluster and lacked urgency. Overall just a horrible period. I thought Swansea started the half okay enough but it ended with us never even testing goalkeeper Carl Rushworth, who is another former Swansea man. That was very noteworthy today, the amount of ex Swansea players in Lampard’s title winning squad. In the starting Coventry XI there were three - Grimes, Rushworth (who was at Swansea as a loanee) and Joel Latibeaudiere, who found an assist today. Off the bench also came Jake Bidwell, and of course Frank Lampard himself has once been part of the Swans. This does speak a little bit about Swansea’s inability to keep good players or to develop some talents. Grimes and Latibeaudiere especially, who perhaps should not have been let go ? Maybe this is a thing all teams experience and Swansea aren’t particularly poor at letting talent go, but I find it interesting nonetheless.

The second half was quite comfortable for Coventry, with Swansea having a few decent chances to close out the gap. Rushworth made a good save to deny Widell’s header and Vipotnik should’ve done better on Widell’s cross a few minutes later. With that said, it was never really close. After those dreadful twelve minutes, the game was practically over.

Josh Key missed this game due to injury and Matos reverted to playing Gally (Ethan Galbraith) at right back. I think this affected our midfield and I noticed we lacked ability with the ball, and in my opinion had trouble gaining control. This is a part of why the game became a bit chaotic, we struggled to control tempo. Honestly, Matt Grimes would’ve been needed in our squad today and his presence on the other team was felt.

In the second half Matos brought on Joel Ward for Eom, moved Galbraith to midfield and Widell out left. We still struggled though and Galbraith himself was subbed out 20 minutes later. Yalcouye, Cullen and Stamenic brought some energy, but as stated previously, the game was already out of sight. Widell had a lot of energy and progressed the ball really nicely, but every time he got in a dangerous area he made the wrong decision. This has been his main problem the entire season and hopefully he can improve it going into next year, because I really think he can become a great asset for us.

The game started okay, and when we started picking up momentum, it got killed by the penalty that led to a Swansea collapse. We could never recover, and I think this is another worrying thing with our squad, we are rarely good from behind. Wrexham at home in December was the last time we won from a losing position and I often feel like the game is not winnable when we concede first.

Overall just a frustrating game against a very good opponent that is a few tiers better. This ended our long string of games at home without a loss, but it was against the best team in the league, so no surprise really. Next time an out of form Sheffield United awaits and hopefully Swansea can prevent three losses in a row. Today we got bested and our home fortress was brought down by the biggest offensive artillery in the league. We move towards Sheffield.

Olle Söderholm is a young and very keen writer who follows Swansea City in Sweden

⚽️ Indy ratings

⚽️ Swans: Lawrence Vigouroux 5 Ethan Galbraith 6 (Marko Stamenic 67) 7 Ben Cabango 4 (c), Cameron Burgess 6 Josh Tymon 5 (Ishe Samuels-Smith 76) 5 Jay Fulton 5 (Malick Yalcouye 67) 6 Gonçalo Franco 6 (Liam Cullen 67) 6 Melker Widell 7 Ronald 4 Jisung Eom 4 (Joel Ward 46) 6 Zan Vipotnik 5

Unused Substitutes: Andy Fisher, Gustavo Nunes, Leo Walta, Adam Idah.

⚽️ Sky Blues: Carl Rushworth, Jay Dasilva (Jake Bidwell 82), Bobby Thomas (Luke Woolfenden 82), Matt Grimes (c), Tatsuhiro Sakamoto (Romain Esse 69) Ellis Simms, Ephron Mason-Clark (Jahnoah Markelo 70), Frank Onyeka, Joel Latibeaudiere, Brandon Thomas-Asante (Josh Eccles 62), Milan van Ewijk.

Unused Substitutes: Ben Wilson, Liam Kitching, Kaine Kesler-Hayden, Victor Torp.

⚽️ Referee: Stephen Martin : Made a few iffy decisions overall very average. The player was already going down for the penalty. 5/10.

⚽️ Attendance: 17,732
Away : 2,227

Olle Söderholm is a young and very keen writer who follows Swansea City in Sweden. More to come on this game.

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Photograph : Swansea City AFC