Swansea City return to business on the pitch today with the visit of Birmingham City to the Swansea.com stadium ( kick off 3pm ) With Morgan Whittaker in the squad and Andrew Fisher now the clubs number one for the rest of the season the Swans go in to this game full of hope.
The distractions and wasted work of the Swansea City recruitment team after hours of painstaking research has to be out to one side despite the wedge it has put between the staff in Wales and the majority ownership in the USA.
Troy Deeney, Marc Roberts, George Hall and Harlee Dean will definitely miss the game for the visitors. The blues have a extremely high foul rate as we saw at St Andrew’s earlier on in the season and frustrations can boil over. The Swans will stick to their passing game which we are sure will again prove to be a certain annoyance to Birmingham City.
Troy Deeney is injured today
Deeney won’t be missed by Swans fans, he scored an eighty ninth leveller at St Andrew’s in November after coming on as a substitute.
Manager John Eustace has overseen the last five games which have all been lost but isn’t deterred and see’s a lot of positives ahead. "Obviously we've had a difficult January but, in a funny way it's made the group stronger and more committed. Everyone's ready to fight and scrap and make sure we get some points again” Captain Dion Sanderson is currently the Blues stand out player. "Dion's been brilliant up to now. He played through injuries during the Christmas period which people don't realise, Eustace added. "He's committed to the club - you can see that in the way he speaks about Birmingham and conducts himself and the way he is around the boys. He's got the ultimate respect from the whole group - he's a player I think that can go to the very top."
The transfer window didn’t seem to be a mysterious event requiring unknown powers last month to Birmingham City. They added three signings in the January - Burnley defender Kevin Long, Reda Khadra on loan from Brighton and Emmanuel Longelo on a permanent deal from West Ham.
Swansea City have little to concern them on the pitch. Liam Walsh is nearly ready to be selected in the match day squad, and Steven Benda won’t play again this season according to the club. After no game in two weeks, and this being the first league encounter at the swansea.com stadium since Burnley were the visitors in early January a decent attendance is expected. This despite a six nations international going ahead in Cardiff.
Last words this morning we leave to Swans manager Russell Martin after a bizarre week at the club. "We accepted the challenge and we’ll keep trying to grow and improve. We need to focus on identity and building. Out of all of this, whatever’s happened, we have a massive chance to do things right now and learn from this. I really hope we can bring success. This was a long-term project when we came in. the rest I can’t control. What we can control is how we do today. I couldn't ask to work with better people in that sense. I've never walked away from anything in my life. It’s not even crossed my mind because of the people here. We do have to try and learn and improve.”
Team news and latest report on the game later.