We are now only seven months on from that moment and I have to say that I am not sure I have ever been more disappointed by the impact of a signing. Certainly not one that came with the hype and promise that Sanches was bringing to the table – or at least the football pitch!
In fairness Sanches was not alone in the disappointment of the summer with all of Paul Clement’s promise from last season disappearing in a run of games that made us look less and less like a football team every week.
Sanches was a Euro 2016 winner with Portugal and when you sign for Bayern Munich then you clearly have something that matters on the football pitch. The German champions don’t just sign any player but in Sanches they had a player who was clearly short on confidence. Or at least that is what we know now.
When you look back with the benefit of hindsight then it is clear that them agreeing to a Swansea move was one designed to try and get the confidence back in Sanches but it has backfired completely with the player looking less and less confident every game he played.
Lots of misplaced passes, free kicks that made Leon Hylton’s look positively accurate (remember the garden centre) and that unforgettable moment when he passed the ball to the advertising hoarding at Stamford Bridge tell us that this is a player who is clearly battling plenty of demons in himself.
Sanches has not played for the Swans since the FA Cup tie at Notts County and has not made his initial expected return to South Wales prompting speculation that his time here is over.
It is difficult to know where it all went wrong for Sanches but we have to hope for his own sake that he can recover the form that earned him the Munich move in the first place. It does nobody any good to see a player so devoid of confidence let alone one that we know does have the talent that would be needed to succeed at the highest level.
However for now I have to file this one under the biggest disappointment that I have had in a Swansea signing. Probably one of the most hyped signings but certainly the one that was as far from the hype as you could imagine.
I do genuinely though hope he gets his form and confidence back, it’s just a shame for us that it couldn’t happen here.