Welcome to the Premiership

The start off the coming season may well be a ‘welcome to the premiership ‘for Swansea as they travel to Eastlands and compare purse strings. The fact that Manchester City have spent in excess of £300 million since there current owner Sheikh Mansour took over the club in 2008 will not deter the Swans from attempting to do justice to there historic promotion to the Premiership.

Swansea on the other hand despite showing profits this year will be looking to carry on where they left off at the end of last season. This may not be helped with the absents of captain Garry Monk who may miss the start of the season with an injury to his foot.

Garry Monk and Ashley Williams seem to have formed a partnership that would give any aspiring centre half an indication of the level performance and consistency required at this club.

Having been previously crowned as the North West player of the year as well as both the Welsh player of the year and club player of the year, Ashley Williams will now be mentally preparing him self to pit his footballing wits against the best in the business.

Brendan Rodgers may well be thinking of introducing Steven Caulker to his starting line-up against Manchester City on 20^th August at Eastland’s in place of the injured

Garry Monk.

Steven Caulker is looking for regular football and believes he has got the pedigree to do just that at Swansea. As a composed centre half who likes to put his foot on the ball and play out of defence, he should be a great addition to Swansea’s squad.

I have to say, without wanting to make comparisons, the style of football which has elevated Tottenham as a force to be reckoned with both domestically and in Europe is a style that has been deployed to great effect.

The Swans have also developed a style of play which has seen them promoted this season and was one of the reasons why Steven Caulker opted to join the Swans on loan from Tottenham.

It will be interesting to see how Swansea do fair this season as the new comers to the Premiership. History shows that a lot of newly promoted teams often struggle to survive in the Premiership as the campaign from start to finish is one that demands optimum levels of performance week in week out in order to secure survival.

It’s widely known that this level of performance can come at a cost in terms of injuries and suspensions which would leave any squad that was ill equipped for this kind of depletion with survival problems.

Brendon Rodgers will be well aware of this and will no doubt be attending to this as we speak.

As a lover of the ‘beautiful game’, I have nothing but admiration for teams that try and play football the way football should be played. Swansea City is one of those teams and I would like to say to Brendon and to Swansea City, congratulations in reaching the premiership and I wish you well.