Phil SumblerYesterday was a strange day. Maybe it was the incessant rain that Storm Alex was bringing to Swansea but with an excellent win against a strong looking Millwall side in the afternoon sending us into the international break with ten points from twelve it was looking like a relaxing evening as we contemplated two weeks until the next game.
Goals from Jake Bidwell and Ben Cabango had given the Swans the win and the league table was looking rosy with us in 4th place heading into the first international break. Thoughts turned briefly back a little over twelve months when we went into the first break with sixteen points from eighteen before slipping slowly away from the top but this felt different. The team looks solid. Defensively we are excellent and with a couple of key additions between the next game against Huddersfield there is a real belief growing that we could be doing something very good this season.
Steve Cooper made reference in his post match press conference to Kristoffer Peterson and a text message from Julian Winter that morning which showed signs of cracks behind the scenes but a manager in wanting to strengthen his squad and lose nobody scenario is not headline news really. Of course the method of communication is not good (remember Laudrup was sacked via a text message…) but it gave the attention seekers of Twitter land the excuses they needed and before 8pm people were discussing Steve Cooper resigning his post.
It was pretty obvious that would not have been the case but when the attention seekers want to make it so, then it happens anyway. It appeared on the forum, add it to the Peterson story earlier in the day and all of a sudden it was being fact. “Word on the street” became a buzz phrase for a while and “I have been told bv several people this is true” were just words to try and add weight when the reality was everyone was simply repeating the original “look at me” Tweet but with every re-tweet or just a simple repeat it gained more credence.
Even Lee Trundle was felt compelled to call it out for what it was and almost as quick as the rumours started they were dying down but not before there was enough for criticism of a man who lifted us to 6th placed last season and an unbeaten start so far to this one.
All these rumours about coops resigning tonight? He is here to stay, amazing start to the season and one of the brightest young mangers about #YJB #STID x
— Lee Trundle (@LeeTrundle10) October 3, 2020
Steve Cooper is clearly a man who divides supporter opinion. There are times when we have been super critical of him but one thing that nobody can argue with is his record at the club. We ended 6th last season, we are currently 4th this season. We are doing this with one of the youngest squads in the division and we are doing it off a budget that at times feels as if it would struggle to do a weekly shop let alone construct a promotion challenging campaign.
Sure Cooper will be hacked off that Peterson is going and he would have every right to moan if the way he found out was via text message especially if it was in the context at which he referenced it. But there was no “board meeting” last night (as was claimed) and Cooper was not even close to walking out of the club.
The irony with Peterson is that Cooper signed him and doesn’t rate him now for whatever reason. Why else would he be at Utrecht last season and let’s not pretend that he didn’t know there was every chance he was off. Maybe it escalated quickly yesterday which caused a slight change in Cooper’s plans for his bench but look at our substitutes yesterday and wonder which seat Peterson was taking anyway?
Cooper is at Swansea to stay. The claims are that Winter wants David Wagner at Swansea with the inside knowledge being that they worked together at Huddersfield. That’s not inside knowledge that is just a statement of fact (them working together) the rest is just added to for effect. Winter will have no budget to sack Cooper, Cooper isn’t likely to walk out (nor should he) and Winter is also told what to do from many thousands of miles away and sacking Cooper isn’t one of those instructions.
So for now, let’s just put this one to bed, enjoy the fact that we have won three and drawn one of our four league games to date, enjoy the international break and look forward to football returning in two weeks. We could – just could – be on the edge of something very special again. Ten years on from the last time.
