Swansea City head to Watford this week for a midweek fixture at Vicarage Road on Wednesday night (7:45pm) The Swans have behind them three games undefeated and things are on the up. Despite that it isn’t that long ago Swans fans were looking down in fear of relegation.

Seven points from nine has been the catalyst for more positivity around the club this week. Coupled with no goals conceded and four scored under interim head coach, Alan Sheehan hopes of getting ‘something’ from this game have increased somewhat. This is by far Sheehan’s biggest test of his second stint as caretaker of the Swansea City squad. His second away game in this current stint is again under the lights, and the very cold weather is due for a return.

Recent form is an indicator of where both clubs are at the moment. Over the last six games the Swans are in the top ten in the league and Watford below in eleventh. In fact over eight games the Swans are still ahead of the Hornets. That does indicate that the hosts this Wednesday are not in full flow. A measure of this can be seen in their results.

Beating Luton Town is one thing but throwing away a goal lead on Saturday at home to Millwall has stirred that hornets nest again. The fans have been very critical of head coach Tom Cleverly, he has many dissenters. By Watford standards he is on his third life surely, there have been times when the club have sacked managers for winning games let alone winning just one home game this year.

That’s the incentive for the Swans, bar beating Luton Town, the Hornets haven’t won on home soil since Boxing Day, and a 2-1 victory over Portsmouth. The cold side of the Hertfordshire club can be countered with some warm to hot form. Drawing at Sunderland 2-2 was a very credible result, especially as they led for the majority of the second half. Wins at Middlesbrough and Derby County have potentially saved Cleverley from the push. However, you have to say come the end of the game on Wednesday evening if points are dropped then it could be Cleverley’s last stand, with the fans at least. In many ways that’s exactly what the majority of the home support will want. Not defeat but Cleverley to go.

If you ask Chief Executive at Watford, Scott Duxbury, then Cleverley is safe for now in his role. He hasn’t even completed a year as club as manager. “When Tom signed his three-year contract back in April 2024 to become head coach, it was clear then he had a passion for developing players to give them the chance to fulfil their potential. Perhaps this is deep-rooted in the upbringing he had as a youth product of one of the world's biggest football clubs. And this will continue to be very important to us as a club which strives to ensure academy graduates have a clear pathway to first-team football. We can look forward with relish to the final run of Championship games, knowing we have a group of players totally behind their head coach. And who says this current season will definitely end on May 3rd ? The professionalism inside the club means everyone is preparing for all possible outcomes”

Interesting last comment there.

⚽️ Where does the danger come from ?
Vakoun Issouf Bayo Is a one in three games goalscorer this season, he can turn games. Unfortunately he hasn’t been having the best of times recently, on loan from Udinese, that Watford link continues even today, he has ten goals to his name this season. The Hornets and Udinese have exchanged players for a number of years, if there have been fifty I wouldn’t be surprised. Some big names as well. Roberto Pereyra and Valon Behrami are good examples as is Odion Ighalo. Bayo hasn’t scored since he got a goal away at Cardiff in a 1-1 draw in the second week of January. He has sat out three games in February after a red card against Norwich City and his return has been patchy, but he is one to keep an eye on.

Club captain, Moussa Sissoko returned for the game on the weekend and will be a big influence against the Swans, but Mamadou Doumbia may well be out. The nineteen year old signed a six year contract at Vicarage Road last year and has caught the eye this season. There’s much for Sheehan to be thinking about, not least that Watford will be desperate to get a second win of the year after some frustrating and poor displays in front of their fans. They too will see this game as a chance to get their season back on track. A team like Swansea City still have a track record of throwing away games this campaign, and are yet to convince everyone this is nothing more than a ‘new manager bounce’

The current league table looks like this.

⚽️ The referee this week is Jeremy Simpson.

REFEREE JEREMY SIMPSON AWAY SWANS RECORD
Has refereed the Swans 4 times away
Swans Won 2 Drawn 0 Lost 2
For 5 Against 6
Yellow cards: Swans 5 Opponents 7
Red cards: Swans 1 Opponents 0

Runners : BHUPINDER SINGH GILL & GRAHAM KANE

Fourth official : JAMES LINNINGTON

SWANSEA TOWN / CITY COMPLETE AWAY RECORD AT WATFORD
PLAYED: 26
WON: 8
DRAWN 4
LOST: 14
FOR: 27 AGAINST: 39

⚽️ Team News : Myles Peart-Harris has returned to his parent club, Brentford and could be out for the rest of the season, a timeframe will be known this week. He had a similar issue when on loan at Portsmouth last season. Coincidentally one of the three goals Myles scored for the Swans this season was the only goal of the game in the 1-0 victory against Watford at the Swansea.com.

We will continue our big game build up this week on the Indy.

Photographs : Gwyn Davies & Reuters tag:reuters.com,2025:newsml_MT1IMGOSP000VOSRND:1599259707

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