Jamal Lowe has played his part this season in the Swans promotion push but things could have been very different after Michael O’Neill revealed that Stoke held talks with the front man last summer before he elected to make his move to Swansea.
Lowe joined the Swans for a reported £800k from Wigan and has scored 9 goals this term to be just behind Andre Ayew in the scoring charts for us this season but it was when he was deliberating over the move that Stoke looked to see if they could sign him.
O’Neill though admitted that the Swans would have looked a more attractive proposition to any player at the time: “We met Jamal and tried to sign him but he was already well down the road with Swansea and unfortunately that’s where he decided to go. It’s been a good move for him, let’s be honest. He’s done very well.
“That’s the market we’re in. He maybe looked at it and saw Stoke at the wrong end of the table and saw Swansea as a club who were in the play-offs. All of that is what we’re trying to build so it becomes more attractive to come to Stoke.”
It was not the first time that O’Neill missed out to the Swans on a transfer target as he admitted that they also enquired about Rhian Brewster last January before the striker also joined the Swans.
“If I look at where we were last year in the January window, we weren’t attractive to those young Premier League loans. More importantly, clubs were wary of sending players out to teams who are struggling,” added O’Neill
“They recognise that the manager may have to do anything to get results. Game time is a priority in their thinking. We had a conversation regarding Rhian Brewster but we were never in a position to get him because Swansea were a more attractive proposition for the player and Liverpool at that point in time.
“That’s how it works. You try to sell what you have to be attractive to younger players and to those types of players who are out of contract.
“And what we do have to sell is a fantastic club, great facilities, great stadium, huge fan base. We’ve just got to get people to see we’re a club that is really determined to move in the right direction and get out of this league.”