Swansea this season.

[Alioune DVToure]

Swansea are the worst team in English top flight in a long long time. They will be absolutely trashed in this division. I can't see how they will score any goals or protect their own goal.

Staying up is about beating the other teams in the bottom six. I don't think we can draw many (if any) conclusions from the drubbing they got from us.

[Niall Quinns Discopants]

Swansea are the worst team in English top flight in a long long time. They will be absolutely trashed in this division. I can't see how they will score any goals or protect their own goal.

Staying up is about beating the other teams in the bottom six. I don't think we can draw many (if any) conclusions from the drubbing they got from us.

That was them fully fit and overperforming because of the first day of the season though. We are million miles ahead of them, of course, but you look at their team, lack of depth, lack of Premier League level goalscorer (THE most important thing if you are looking to stay up), lack of decent playmaker (although Sinclair and to lesser extent Dyer might be able to create something from the wings) and their plan to try and play decent football and it's not looking too rosy.

[Ted Hughes]

They played excellent football & for a while were a class above us in possession. Then we got up to PL speed & the difference was apparent. They were very quick on the break though & that will probably determine their fate. If they can get the goals when they get in those positions they may survive but otherwise they need a plan B. Most teams cause us more problems at set pieces but Swans seemed to be pure football & nothing else. That could be their downfall.

I disagree about them being a class above us in possession Ted. At the beginning of the match they were respecting possession and were focussing on keeping the ball. That much is true. However, they were unable to penetrate our defence so whilst they had the ball they did very very little with it. By half time they probably shaded the possession stat but were unable to create chances with it.
When we had the ball we were more direct purely because we were able to unlock them with fewer passes. Off memory I think it was 10 shots to 2 at half time.

I was talking purely about the 1st 15- 20 mins. They were knocking the ball around very quickly, like the rags did & we had similar problems getting the ball off them & we were off with our passing radar, as at Wembley. Once we got into our stride, there was no comparison. The difference in class was then huge in our favour.