Cooper: No panic

SWANSEA boss Steve Cooper has told his players to forget the gloom and get back in the Championship promotion race.

The Swans are nine points behind secondplaced Watford with a game in hand.

They were poor in losing 1-0 in added time at Birmingham on Friday and that follows defeats to Bournemouth and Cardiff .

“It’s three losses and three without a goal, but we can’t lose confidence or start questioning,” said Cooper.

“The more points you drop now, it will get tougher and tougher as there’s less games to play. The three points become more and more important now and we’re well aware of that.

“We are disappointed with the result at Birmingham where we were poor, but we’ve got to make sure we draw a line under it and get ready for the next one.

“We have got to start working harder and prepare for Monday.”

The Swans didn’t look like scoring against Birmingham and Cooper (above) added: “That wasn’t a good version of us – we’re a much better team than that.

“It’s important that we don’t panic, we stick together, I lead well and we remain focused because everything’s still there to play for.”

Preston defender

Andrew Hughes believes his side have given themselves a platform to build on ahead of their trip to Swansea following their last-gasp 1-1 draw with leaders Norwich City.

“We can use the draw with Norwich as a building block,” the left-back said.

“It gave us a good lift in the changing room and sometimes it takes a result like that to get everyone going again.

“Hopefully we can build on the result and do the same at Swansea.”