Swansea v Watford build-up:
EVEN in Swansea, the home of Dylan Thomas, you don’t always begin at the beginning. Because it’s only now, five games into the campaign – and almost 10 months into the job – that it really starts for Paul Clement.
Swansea City head back to the Liberty Stadium, the fortress that so far has seen no home points to go with no home goals, with the team’s head coach rightly pointing out that there are no alarm bells, either.
Instead, the only sound should be a whistle for the season to truly start against Watford.
That’s not to say the five points gained so far should be dismissed; the last two seasons show the tally already on the board is more than welcome.
Indeed, if you compare last year’s corresponding fixtures – with Newcastle taking the place of relegated Hull – Swansea are actually two points better off with more clean sheets than they’d managed in the first 14 games of 2016/17.
But the hope and the aim is that last year can soon stop being a reference point, and that the side and the club can kick on.
They haven’t quite managed it yet, not on all fronts.
Not while it’s felt like pre-season at times, a phoney war almost as the side slogged their way through the remainder of the transfer window and it’s drag to deadline day where business was finally completed and the side available took its shape.
Swansea weren’t ready to be judged before that happened and, as they wait for two key signings in Renato Sanches and Wilfried Bony to get fully up to speed, they’re probably not ready now.
They certainly weren’t against Newcastle where, taking a step back, the disappointment with the defeat was as much to do with anticlimax as the performance.
And, as rightly judged by the manager through his tactics, Tottenham wasn’t the place to look for signs of it all clicking under Clement as he seeks to take the next, new step with this team.
More time is probably needed, but that would be said by nigh-on every rival in the Premier League.
And so this is where this latest incarnation of the Swansea Way needs to try and show itself.
Because while there may still be lingering pessimism and doubts, perhaps a hangover of recent struggles, there is every reason to believe that Swansea are close to getting it really right.
As mentioned, it’s not been obvious on the face of things. No-one has had fewer shots on goal than Swansea so far this year (30, with just seven on target). Even while the defensive foundations look solid, only Burnley have conceded more shots against and no goalkeeper has saved more than Lukasz Fabianski’s 24.
Even taking into account the type of approach needed for Manchester United and, more pertinently, Tottenham away, the numbers do not make for comfortable reading.
What should bring comfort, though, is the man at the helm. Make no mistake about it, Clement may not be the sound-bite politician of past Swansea managers, but he deserves more credit and faith in his ability than it seems some are willing to give him.
The survival job was close to mission impossible given the mess inherited and having rebuilt once, he is doing so again – only on a far firmer footing.
The way the team plays needed to change and had to, given the loss of Gylfi Sigurdsson and Fernando Llorente, valuable players but players who sometimes created the option of others looking to them too much to make things happen. As Clement mentioned in the build-up, this team has a different feel to last term, one that is evolving.
The onus is back on the collective, only being faster and more fluid with the sound possession base that has been restored. It’s been difficult for different reasons to get that balance right before now.
But there is a feeling that the players are there to move forward and achieve that, but Clement’s challenge is finding the balance to bring more – much more – of a final third threat about Swansea.
Waiting for Bony, Sanches, Roque Mesa and even Tammy Abraham to adjust to new surroundings and standards is a frustrating test of patience when ‘must-win’ games always seem just around the corner.
Clement has admitted he has to
weigh up decisions over allowing players to find a rhythm or giving other opportunities, conceding that he is in the business of needing to win games while also developing a team.
But that takes time at the best of times: Roberto Martinez’s first full season started slowly, as did Brendan Rodgers’.
With Swansea more established, more under scrutiny and in a Premier League with less patience than ever before, it is tough for Clement.
But there is that sense that this is the opportunity – against Watford and in a run of six games where they only face one of last year’s top-half – for Swansea to show their new selves.
Of course, Clement will have memories of last year’s ‘easy run’ before Easter that ended up almost costing the side it’s topflight place when they failed to win a game. But Swansea have already shown they are made of sterner stuff, and now it’s about that slickness on top.
A player who excited upon his arrival but has been kept in reserve to feel his way into the British game, Mesa can still be a key man for this side.
Sam Clucas has started solidly, but seems to be itching for the chance to show the extra energy he brings. If the diamond remains preferred, Martin Olsson’s slow return to top form could be vital.
And there are now options that Clement should, and will, use to try and take different approaches if at first it doesn’t succeed.
With training ground confidence in method and manager high, Clement has the nous to get it right and show that the rebuild is really heading somewhere.
After the caveats of the last five games, with the defensive foundations laid, it’s time for Swansea to begin again.