Planet Swans ArchivesThe Swans return to action this weekend comes in the shape of a trip to Stoke on Sunday in front of the TV cameras. It will promise to be a tough test but one that we are more than capable of coming through and increasing our hold on that Top 5 spot as the season passes its one fifth stage.
With two weeks to ponder on the decisions it is now time for the Swans fans to consider their team selection for the game against Stoke and put themselves in Garry Monk’s shoes as they make that selection.
The defensive line will naturally continue I think to pick itself with the excellent Fabianski in goals and seeing lining up in front of him his captain Ashley Williams, Federico Fernandez and Angel Rangel. Neil Taylor has come in for some stick in recent games but I just cannot see anyone starting bar him against Stoke so that is the first five names on the team sheet sorted.
Moving into midfield, we have Ki Sung Yeung and Gylfi Sigurdsson who are certainties to start but with the suspension of Jonjo Shelvey it gives an opportunity for Thomas Carroll to impress in the starting line up. There probably aren’t really any viable alternatives to Carroll at the moment so that looks like another decision that may not take too much thinking on.
The wide men will always test the thinking of the manager at the moment but Wayne Routledge and Nathan Dyer for me will get the nod ahead of either Montero or Emnes but both of those will start on the bench and give us a great option when/if it is time to make a change.
That leaves Wilfried Bony to return to the starting line up. I do think this will happen this time even though he dropped to the bench after his previous international exploits. He has had one more day to recover this time and that period will be enough for him to retain his starting position and look to build on his first goal of the season against Newcastle two weeks ago.
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