From Exeter City to lighting up the Championship – He’s the Key but what is his secret?

When Josh Key scored his first Swansea City goal in the 3-1 win over Plymouth on Saturday it highlighted and confirmed things that we have been able to see all season in that Key was one of the signings of the summer – not just at Swansea City but in the Championship as a whole.

The way that the summer signing from Exeter City has slotted into the side has been one of the most seamless transitions we have seen and when you consider that he is in amongst Premier League loans he has made that transition in a way that far exceeds expectations of a twenty-three year old making a step up in his career.

Key has been present in every Swans league side this season and the way he covered close to the full length of the pitch for the third goal at the weekend showed exactly why he is that regular feature and could easily be for many years to come.  He came to us as a right back with a reputation for an eye for goal and for a former Exeter player who was born in Torquay a first goal for a club against Plymouth would have been even more sweet.

Key’s first interview as a Swans player, made after he signed back in July, has probably summed up his three months in a Swansea shirt –

“I am an attack-minded defender. I like to get forward and get balls in the box, but I am also a willing defender,” he said at the time.

“If I need to get back and defend I will, and I will put all my effort into defending. You will see a high work-rate from me.

“I will give my all on the pitch, I won’t leave anything out there. One thing you will get from me is work-rate and I will want to show that every week on the pitch.”

It is difficult to argue that Key has done anything but deliver on what he has said in that opening gambit and his first goal for the club was just testament to get into the box and have a high work rate.

The Swans were first linked with a move for Key back in the January window but with the Grecians keen to hold onto the defender at the time it was the next window that saw the move become permanent.

In that first interview, Key referenced his desire to come here though and glad that, despite the change in management, the Swans carried on with their move for the defender.

“I am so happy. It has been a long time coming, there’s been a lot of links and the first time I heard about it I felt it would be the ideal fit for me,” he said.

“It’s taken a little while to happen, but I’m really pleased to be here.

“The facilities are top quality and it’s a place where you know you can really come and improve and work on yourself.”

Fast forward just three short months and the name of Key is surely one of the first names on the team sheet when Duff makes his selections for games and Key was the latest of the Swans players to talk of the togetherness in the squad during the bad run in the early weeks of the season.

“We need to be together and we showed that unity by celebrating together,” said Key after the weekend win over Plymouth..

“It has been a tough couple of months and it has been frustrating.

“We have had to try and find it within us to stay consistent in our mentality, and I think one of the biggest things about this team is its mentality.

“It has been driven from the top and the lads have been fantastic, everyone has really pushed each other.

“These four wins are not an accident, this has been coming because even when we were not winning games, that togetherness was there.”

And what of that first goal in Swansea colours? “To score the goal and celebrate it with our fans is a moment I will remember for a very long time,” added Key.

“I hope I did the fans here proud, I am not sure where I found the energy from, to be honest.

“But that has always been part of my game. I will always try and find it in me to do those extra yards, and I will keep doing so.

“I might have regretted it had I not scored! But when you make those runs, you have to think of the rewards for making them.

“When I saw Pato running up the pitch you know the quality he has, and the way he picked me out with that pass was just unreal and I just had to pass it in. I think I almost surprised myself, but thankfully it went in.”

And from our perspective let’s hope that this is the first goal of many in what is turning into a very positive Swansea City career even in these relatively early days.