Welcome to Swansea Independent as we focus this morning on the Welsh derby and the most successful manager in Welsh football history when it comes to Swansea v Cardiff fixtures in the history of the game.

No other manager has done it before, and by that we mean the double. Russell Martin emphatically did that last season. This time around he has taken his side to the right part of the championship and victory in the derby today would see the swans go fourth.

Ryan Manning is raring to go but this morning it is a case of does Russell Martin want to risk him with a number of games to go before the break for the World Cup ? He has another week without a fixture after this one and then it’s Bristol City. The Tuesday after that is Preston away and the fixtures continue to roll in right up to the World Cup.

Harry Darling has surely done enough to be included in this morning team selection, and really a side not dissimilar to the one which beat Reading could be expected.If the swans win today it will be three in a row and six out of eight for the dominant Welsh side who seem to be everybody’s favourites today. And that’s the real danger, we saw it only a week ago at Burnley what complacency achieves in a league that throws up so many quandaries every week.

Nothing is certain.

Team news will be here at 11am.

The teams are in !

Swansea City: Steven Benda; Nathan Wood, Harry Darling, Ben Cabango; Joel Latibeaudiere, Jay Fulton, Matt Grimes (captain), Matty Sorinola; Ollie Cooper, Luke Cundle; Michael Obafemi.

Substitutes: Andy Fisher, Olivier Ntcham, Liam Cullen, Armstrong Oko-Flex, Fin Stevens, Kyle Naughton, Cameron Congreve.

Cardiff City: Ryan Allsop, Ryan Wintle, Joe Ralls (captain), Sheyi Ojo, Callum O'Dowda, Tom Sang, Curtis Nelson, Cedric Kipre, Andy Rinomhota, Niels Nkounkou, Callum Robinson.

Substitutes: Jak Alnwick, Kion Etete, Romaine Sawyers, Gavin Whyte, Vontae Campbell, Jack Simpson, Mark Harris.

Photographs licensed from Reuters

Swansea City Polls