Swansea v Rotherham

[jackaway]

Swansea v Rotherham Mon 27 Feb 20:00
It’s newly promoted Rotherham up next at the Swansea.com Stadium, the fixture was moved from Saturday afternoon to Monday night as it’s live on Sky Sports. Quite what the attraction is to televise this game I don’t know, as both teams are struggling, Swans 4 defeats in the last 5 matches, Rotherham 1 win in 5 and 19th in the table, a point above our Cardiff friends.
They have a new manager Matt Taylor who took over from Paul Warne last October after he left for Derby County. Last time out they beat 8th place and on form Sunderland 2-1 so are not to be treated lightly and we will have to be at our best to get a result.
The January Transfer Window went well for Rotherham with 5 loan players coming in, 3 from the PL and 2 from the Championship, plus the free transfer signings of centre-back Sean Morrison from Cardiff and forward Jordan Hugill from Norwich.
The Swans defence lately has been a shambles and we are missing goalkeeper Steven Benda out injured for the season. Substitute Andy Fisher doesn’t inspire much confidence and is part of the reason why the defence is struggling.
The insistence by the coaching team that we play the ball out from the back is costing us many goals with opposing teams pressing us high until we lose possession.
With only 3 wins in 19 matches we need to turn around our poor form pronto and start picking up points.

[Estoban]

Yes, Stoke game we were all over the place, didn’t keep our formation, leaving Stoke players unmarked and we were wide open on the flanks and in midfield.
Tactically inept, a weak squad, no leadership on or off the field, we are a mess.
It’s going to be fun on Monday night then.

[jackaway]

Swans:
Andy Fisher, Joel Latibeaudiere, Ben Cabango, Nathan Wood, Matty Sorinola (Cundle82’), Joe Allen (Fulton 57’), Matt Grimes (Cullen 89’), Ryan Manning (Ntcham 57’), Morgan Whittaker, Ollie Cooper, Joel Piroe.

Subs:
Andreas Sondergaard, Jay Fulton, Harry Darling, Olivier Ntcham, Luke Cundle, Liam Cullen, Liam Walsh.

[jackaway]

Swansea 1 (Piroe 42’) - Rotherham 1 (Ogbene 52’)
More of the same last night I’m afraid. We were awful and really should have lost this match. From the first minute when Ogbene hit the post you knew how bad we were going to be. We went in at half-time 1-0 up thanks to a fine strike from Piroe against the run of play, but as has happened so many times this season the opposition came out rejuvenated second-half and it took only six minutes for us to concede.
It was that man Ogbene, who was coming to us in January and then wasn’t, who scored the equaliser, first shot blocked and then he managed to score with the rebound after having fell on his backside, sticking his foot out to nudge the ball over the line whilst two of our defenders watched on.
With 35% possession Rotherham had 14 shots on goal to our 7, and 6 corners to our 3.
Yet again a team below us in the table, and threatened with relegation, outplayed us, their bigger players bullied us off the ball and had a higher work rate and it was a relief to hear the final whistle.
We’ve deteriorated at an alarming rate since the Birmingham home defeat, all confidence is gone, our sub-standard goalkeeper had another poor game and our defending was woeful.
Still we keep on with the suicidal passing out from the back and get caught out.
Martin is nothing if persistent with these tactics, and will fall on his sword soon, this style of play is not working with these players and if we’re not proactive and dump him soon he’ll take us down.

[jackaway]

Estoban, fun night it was not!
Players booed off the field at half-time and full-time, not a pleasant atmosphere.
Martin went straight down the tunnel at the end of the game, I think his time with us is drawing to a close.
He cannot rally the troops, he will not change his tactics and its now obvious to even his staunchest supporters that his way of playing will never work with the players he’s got.
There’s only one obvious outcome.

[jackaway]

Match report

https://www.swanseacity.com/news/rep...erham-united-1

[jackaway]

Extended highlights

https://www.swanseacity.com/news/ext...erham-united-0

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“We are in a tough moment”

https://www.swanseacity.com/news/rus...e-tough-moment

[Iolo]

Boys, boys, we are in crisis. That was terrible last night.
The players have lost all confidence, the substitutions were bizarre and smacked of desperation, even Martin’s favourite our silent captain was subbed for the first time that I can remember.
Allen (is he still not able to play 90mins) and our only attacking threat Manning coming off after 57mins.

[Estoban]

Allen was poor last night and Manning, great going forward, is no defender.
There didn’t look to be more than 10k there last night and it was cold and nothing to cheer up the fans.
Where are our next points coming from is the question. We’ve deteriorated at an alarming rate,