Southampton 3-0 Swansea City – Williams gets it wrong as the Swans exit without a whimper

Swansea City’s FA Cup campaign for this season lasted a total of ninety-two minutes as they went down at St Mary’s to a three goal defeat and in a game where we were nowhere near a competitive level.  Another poor performance on the road and yet another performance where many players need to look at themselves and question their commitment to the cause.

There would not have been too many Swans fans who would have expected a cup shock when they saw the team selections an hour before kick off with Southampton being relatively strong in their selection and Luke Williams going in without Harry Darling and Ben Cabango with an overall selection that certainly had at least one eye on next week’s South Wales derby at the Cardiff City Stadium.

Jon McLaughlin came into the Swans line-up for his first appearance since signing at the back end of last summer as Luke Williams clearly made indications that his priorities certainly lie elsewhere than the FA Cup.

Some will tell you that the Swans started brightly and, in truth, they did but he brightness evaporated after about five minutes when the Saints started to stamp their authority on the game and the Swans were very much second best for the majority of the first half as they struggled to get any hold of a game.   Southampton went into the game on the back of just one win in twenty Premier League games to date and very much still under threat of turning in the worst Premier League season to date but they looked anything but a bad side against a Swansea side who were typically pedestrian for long periods of the first half and before too long into the game they found themselves behind in the tie.

And in typical Swansea fashion it was not helped by some poor defending of what was just a reasonably aimless hoof upfield by Aaron Ramsdale in the Southampton goal.   As the ball dropped in our half a headed scramble saw the ball head further towards our defence and found McLaughlin inexplicibly coming out of his area only to see Sulemana hook the ball over him and perfectly into the net to almost gift the Saints the opening goal of the afternoon.

It was not their first chance and certainly not the first one that we had played a part in making it easier for them to create those chances and as they came forward on multiple occasions against a retreating Swansea defence you often wondered whether it was more a case of when the second goal arrived rather than if.   The Swans were putting together yet another half of football where they were not to trouble the Southampton goalkeeper when a quick flowing move saw a static Swansea defence score a second.

Good movement on the left saw the Swans defence retreat but it was at half the speed of the Southampton attack and as the ball was crossed low into the penalty area it was the easiest of tasks for Dibling to slide the second goal home and the game, even with fifty-five minutes to go, had that feeling of being over even at that stage.

At 2-0 at half-time it was always going to be interesting if either manager was to make changes although changes for the home side would always have been unlikely given the ease at which they coasted through the first half.   For the Swans it would have been a case as to whether Luke Williams felt the first forty-five minutes gave him any hope that we could turn it round in the second half although you questioned whether we wanted progression given the nature of the team selection made before the game kicked off.   The answer was no changes from the Swans and that meant the early stages of the second half took on a predictable consistency to that in which we saw for the first period.

Southampton now though were happy to sit back a little and allow the Swans more possession but again there was little that we were doing with it as a consistent list of names looked disinterested in a competition which has a long and proud history but this game and performance will not live long in the memory certainly not by supporters of the Swans anyway.

2-0 became 3-0 in the 65th minute when Dibling scored his second and the full surrender was completed when just minutes later the Swans made their changes with Fulton, Allen and Cullen introduced at the expense of Grimes, Christie and Franco.   It was never going to make the difference on an afternoon such as this and you knew it, I knew it, everyone in St Mary’s knew it and, most importantly, Luke Williams also knew it.   Yet again we were watching a game where questions have to be asked over the standard of performances that we were seeing from individual players and in some instances why we spend time and money developing players for other sides when we completely see our own younger players seemingly ignored.   Maybe the irony was not lost on anyone when Cameron Congreve put Bromley briefly ahead at Newcastle in their own tie this afternoon.

The Saints even found game time for Nathan Wood to come on with a little over fifteen minutes to go with the game over and the question really at this stage was what the final score would be and certainly not which team would progress – that decision was made possibly even before the first goal found the back of the net in the first half.

In the Swans goal McLaughlin was having a particularly traumatic debut and it is difficult to see that here we have any level of keeper you would put any more confidence in than you would Andy Fisher but then again he was never designed to be long term although the credentials to be short term even have to be questioned.

The appearance of Josh Ginnelly was a welcome piece of good news for the Swans and we have to hope that he will stay fit for the long term but it was still the same old Swansea as McLoughlin again played us into pressure and was forced into a good save from Armstrong although the presence of the linesman’s flag would have saved him anyway.   Joe Allen came closest to scoring for the Swans when he hit the post shortly afterwards but it was a rare moment of attacking from a side that even as the game ticked into the last minute was pedestrian and backwards in their approach more often than attacking and fluid.

The news had filtered through that a home tie with Burnley was the reward for the Saints although their biggest battle ahead is the retaining of their Premier League place which looks extremely unlikely at best but games like this can boost confidence although with Man Utd, Nottingham Forest and Newcastle being their next three opponents, a win over Swansea City is not necessarily something that will stand up in those games as things to test their opponents.

As the two minutes of stoppage time were played out without notable incident, bar maybe a yellow card for Ryan Manning, the final whistle rang out and the Swans were out of the FA Cup without ever really playing themselves into it.  Liam Cullen half tested the keeper with a 92nd minute free kick that was probably going just wide but that was as good as it got from a very poor performance from the Swans.

Of course there are bigger games to come for Luke Williams and his side but questions should be asked of the way we exited the competition without barely an effort and the team selection was, without a doubt, the wrong one.   Cardiff are next up for the Swans, a game where Luke Williams will know his side simply have to turn up.   The supporters will demand it.

MATCH FACTS AND LINE UPS

OTHER FA CUP RESULTS

NEXT UP FOR THE SWANS