Williams blasts “unacceptable” Swans but the performance has been seen before

Luke Williams was not a happy man at the end of last night’s 1-0 defeat to Wycombe at the Swansea.com Stadium – a result that ended the Swans participation in this year’s Carabao Cup, a participation that ended with barely a whimper from a dreadful performance.

From start to finish the Swans players looked disinterested, demotivated, slow and clueless every time they had the ball.   Defensively we looked exactly as we were – a line that had never played together before – and when you see a team sheet that has the names of both Grimes and Fulton on it you know exactly what the midfield is going to deliver.  And it isn’t a free flowing attacking brand of football.   It will be as far from that as you can possibly get.

The people that get excited about statistics will point to a figure north of seventy per cent when talking about possession but we have said for some time now that possession means absolutely diddly squat when you cannot get the ball forward enough.   It says it all when a side from League One will not have an easier night this season then the one we presented to  them in the game.

Their keeper did not have a meaningful thing to do all evening and there was little wonder that Williams was pretty damming of the team performance at the end of the game.  The problem is that he is the manager and needs to shoulder the responsibility for his players performances, after all he has the ability to hook any one of them from the game at any time.

Williams talked about an “appalling first half” but we cannot lose sight here of the fact that after that appalling first half he sent the same players back out to play the first thirteen minutes of the second half.  That tells you there is no consequence within this squad for sub standard performances and until that part changes then we will continue to be served up more of the same.

This isn’t the fault of Luke Williams solely.   Ever so gradually over a period of time we have eroded most things away that were good about the football club.   Our investment in the playing side has reduced season on season, our transfer policy has got worse (although there are signs we may have turned that round although too early to judge on many of our summer acquisitions) and as a result the football we play has become nothing more than boring and predictable.   For several seasons now we have been easy to play against and even a League One team under a League One coach proved that to be the case yesterday evening.

“I think we were appalling in the first half, Wycombe were miles better than us,” said Williams after the game.

“The second half we improved, but the opposition defended their lead brilliantly, and we did not have enough quality to make a breakthrough.

“We did not get anything because we did not deserve anything.

“There was a lack of energy and intensity in that first half, and that is appalling, I will not accept that.

“You can have games where you don’t play brilliantly well, that’s football, but we cannot have people strolling around not showing enough energy.

“Some of the errors we made under no pressure were completely unacceptable.”

Each and every word that Williams said it is difficult to argue with.   People strolling around, not enough energy, no intensity, appalling are all words that went through my head watching the game but the thing was that didn’t change.   Bianchini tried to put in some effort but he was swallowed up in a static side who we can only assume didn’t care and therefore have no professional pride in what they do.

For several seasons now we have talked on these pages about actions being louder than words but the words still remain the loudest and the actions never actually seem to match them or get even close to them.

Unacceptable, disgraceful and embarrassing.   The actions match those words.