Swansea show promise despite Aguero-inspired Man City rout
Published:The headlines this morning may all be about Sergio Aguero and his brilliant Premier League debut, but Swansea’s Premier League debut also showed subtler signs of promise.
For the first half-an-hour the Swans more than matched the Citizens and continued where they left off in the Championship last season – passing their opponents into submission.
However, they lacked a killer pass in the final third and their first thought was to always go back rather than really take the game to Roberto Mancini’s side.
That mentality will surely change against sides who aren’t as solid defensively as Man City. Let’s not forget, this is a side that had the best defence in the league last term, conceding just 12 goals at the newly-named Etihad Stadium.
The Swans also completed 486 passes in the game – more than any other team in the Premier League this weekend.
Admittedly much of the possession was in the middle third, but their confidence on the ball will serve them well.
Speaking to the BBC, Rogers said: “For large parts of the game some of our passing and movement was fantastic. I’m very proud of the players.
“It’s obviously a baptism of fire coming to this club, who are going to be challenging in Europe, never mind in the Premier League.
“We won’t play this type of opposition every week. In a funny way we’ll take a lot of confidence from it.”
Another huge positive for the Swans was the debut of goalkeeper Michael Vorm who produced a string of fine saves to keep the Citizens at bay and the scoreline respectable.
The Swans welcome Wigan and old boss Roberto Martinez to the Liberty next weekend. That will be a far better barometer of how the first Welsh Premier League club will fare in the division.
But for now, the Swans have shown enough promise in their first 90 minutes to suggest they can give survival a real go.
A better relegation bet might be to back QPR to go down at 11/10. They also suffered an opening 4-0 defeat but at home to Wigan – a far more concerning result than an away defeat to Manchester City.
