The Swans take on eight placed Hull City on Saturday at the Swansea.Com Stadium, kick off 3pm. The game brings with it numerous questions with the home side in seventeenth, albeit seven points off the play offs.
This Swansea side isn’t performing at the levels they should, but news is reaching us that Kristian Fletcher (below) could receive a first team call up. He didn’t feature in this weeks under 21 victory away at Bristol City and has been training with the first team on numerous occasions through the Internarional break. It’s right he does receive some first team experience, his goals for the under 21 side have been a real asset to the age grade side. He came from DC United and only has around five weeks of his loan to run. His inclusion can’t do any harm with goals from the current forward line becoming hard to achieve.
UPDATE : Kristian was given permission to return to the USA on Monday, albeit having trained all week with the first team. If it’s for Thanksgiving we won’t see him on Saturday for sure.
We will cover the Swans team news later this week but the obvious names of Nathan Wood and Joe Allen are out, plus services of Josh Ginnelly are gone for the season. Mykola Kuharevich Is making great strides in his recovery but we have been told he won’t make Saturdays squad. That’s four players who would automatically make it in to the squad if available this Saturday. In three cases the starting eleven.
Hull City have won some pretty decent scalps this season. You could say at times a bit hit and miss but they excelled winning away at Stoke City, Birmingham City, Blackburn Rovers and most impressively at Leicester City. They do have a decent record on the road and their league position is encouraging to Tigers fans bar the fact their ticket take up hasn’t been impressive for this game. What is impressive is the team management of Liam Rosenior, his father always willing to chat and assist this website, a gentleman indeed. Liam seems unhappy though with the way his side has been treated by officials this season. " I don't like speaking about referees. It's a difficult job," Rosenior told the assembled press earlier today. "There's a lot of conversation around them. I do feel that our style of play, because we play into people's feet, we actually want contact and want people to jump in on us. Sometimes it happens so often in a game, the refs aren't giving free-kicks. What I would ask is that referees look at each incident and make a decision on that. I think we're still the most fouled team in the league, we're still very highly penalised for the fouls that we give away, but I think the refs have to have a greater understanding about the way that teams play because it has a massive impact on that. It's so difficult, it's human error. It's hard for referees. They put their heads above the parapet. They're reffing in front of 20, 40, 60,000 people and they're making decisions because they love the game. There's always going to be errors. From my point of view, my job's at stake. The club's future is at stake and it's the same for the opposition manager and club we play against."
"You want to get the decision right, you want it to flow as much as possible because that's what makes it the spectacle it is. I'd like to be talking about VAR next season when we're in the Premier League."
With players from both sides now firmly back in the fold of their clubs this game will be won by the team who fights the hardest and keep their composure. Match officials are Dean Whitestone assisted by Daniel Leach and Robert Merchant. Scott Oldham will be the fourth official. More on this game as we get closer here on The Indy. Your finest match day build ups on your favourite Swans website.