Swans 0 Stoke 1 – Poor Swans Lose Home Record

If we started the last period after the international break we started it slowly but this time we started it even worse as we gifted Stoke an early lead and never ever in the game looked like pulling it back.

Too many passes went astray, too many players looked disinterested in what was happening on the pitch and certainly the calls of putting the Euro 2016 celebrations to bed fell on deaf ears as Stoke must have wondered just why we were making it so easy for them.

The penalty came after just three minutes to decide the game. Cork gave the ball away in midfield, the Swans defence was static as the Stoke player danced through and Williams cluttered him in the area. The penalty sent Fabianski the wrong way and as it turned out it was the only recent scoring chance of the game.

Make no mistake on this game, Stoke are a poor side but on this evidence we were far worse. It is difficult to pick out any real positives from the game. Barrow and Montero were rarely in it, the midfield just did not click at any point in time and the early season form of Gomis and Ayew is a distant memory as neither have really made their presence felt in the last 4 weeks or so.

The defence had very little to do but as we saw with the penalty kick, what we did have to do we failed miserably at as we completed probably the worst performance not just of this season but of a few before it.

Garry must now pick his players up and demand a performance of them this weekend. Too often in our winless run we have heard statements that it is not good enough but against Stoke it got worse instead of better and that is something we need to address.

As someone who was forced to watch on television I felt for the neutrals who sat with me and watched the game who worried for me if this was the normal standard of performance – we know it isn’t but now it is time to prove it before this winless run turns into something more worrying.

That is about all that can be said on a depressing night for the Swans with plenty to do ahead of the visit to Villa this weekend

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