Planet Swans ArchivesAnother game, another blank and another one with no maximum points. Not what we wanted to see as 12,000 plus answered the rallying call of the Chairman to watch, they hoped, the Swans deliver what was a well overdue performance tonight. It never happened. Early promise (5 minutes or so) evaporated into the norm these days of plenty of possession but no real cutting edge up front (or in midfield for that matter) to break down a resolute Tranmere defence, even if it was one that had evidently arrived for a point.
In fairness that sounds like sour grapes because the reality is we were as bad as Tranmere in terms of ability the only difference being we wanted to win the game. At least I assume we wanted to win the game – it was hard to tell.
After two games out because of months of bad form, Willy was recalled after a bad 45 minutes from Oakes (where is the justice?) and, as expected, Alan Tate moved to the centre alongside Izzy with Amankwaah filling in for Tate at right back. Lee Trundle on his return had to be satisfied with a place on the bench alongside Oakes, Butler, Austin and Macdonald
Big Willy
Amankwaah Izzy Tate Williams
Britton Way Pratley Robbo
Fallon Knight
Subs: LT10, Austin, Butler, Oakes, Macdonald
The visitors should have had the lead inside five minutes after a horrendous mistake by Izzy left Greenacre with the seemingly easy task of opening the scoring but luckily for us his shot was well saved by Willy to save his defender’s blushes.
Within two minutes it was Swansea’s chance to spurn a great opportunity when Fallon could only weakly connect with a header from a right wing cross by Britton (?) and left the keeper the chance to save and concede a corner. Although the header was well plced it lacked the power it needed to beat the keeper. Knight had a similar chance minutes later from a Williams cross but his header didn’t even find the target and even at that stage you wondered if it was to be one of those nights.
Greenacre again came close for the visitors as he almost capitalised on another defensive blunder in the Swans defence whilst from the resulting corner a static Gueret was happy to see the ball bounce back off his upright and to safety. All of this action came with the game less than half an hour old but it was to be the ‘highlight’ of an irritating night at the Liberty.
Tranmere were opening their time wasting tactics book within the first ten minutes of the game and yet again we saw a referee incapable, or not prepared to, book players for it that early in a game. One day we shall see a referee be prepared to take this bold step which will make the rest think twice about carrying on with the tactics. Sadly for us, teams also realise that it frustrates us and the more they do it the worse we become and when we trudged off at half time you felt the game had everything written on it bar a Swansea City win.
No changes at half time, a 15 minutes that saw both Willy and Tate out on the pitch – Tate presumable with some kind of knock to run off and Willy for no real apparent reason. All of that meant no changes to the playing side of things but then again we probably expected it to be that case.
The changes came 15 minutes into the half and when they came, the reaction of the crowd and players said it all. A chorus of boos greeted the sight of the number 7 being called off and as Leon left the field the chants of Leon Leon said that the boos were for the decision rather than the player. Leon shrugged off the comforting arm of whoever offered it and as he disappeared down the tunnel so a couple of water bottles flew ahead of him. The second substitution was as predictable as it could be – LT10 for Knight – saw Knight take his shirt off and follow the other Leon down the tunnel. LT10 was the right move, surely the chance was there to go three up front?
And with the loss of Britton possibly our best attacking force of the night to date was gone and we looked poorer for it. Macdonald never really got into the game and it must have been a good ten minutes before we deemed him good enough to touch the ball. He is a good player but really we needed the pace of Britton which was working for us.
LT10 created one chance for himself in his time on the pitch but by this time the crowd had lost interest and with it it seemed as if the players had followed suit. The best chance of the game had fallen some time before to Robinson but it summed up where we are at the moment as he blazed it over when it seemed easier to score.
The end came, the inevitable jeers followed and as ever we were left with those that always do to acknowledge the people that turned up to watch. Jackett was long gone by this time down the tunnel, the two Leons were already suited and booted and not ready for the post mortem that I assume comes after most games.
We are up two places but only because of the fact we play a day before the rest – it is likely we will be bottom half come 5pm tomorrow and with that in mind, these are very worrying times for those in charge at Swansea City. I would love to read their minds this evening.
On the plus side, it didn’t waste a Saturday afternoon……
