{"id":70403,"date":"2022-10-08T19:17:33","date_gmt":"2022-10-08T18:17:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/?p=70403"},"modified":"2022-10-08T19:17:33","modified_gmt":"2022-10-08T18:17:33","slug":"martin-thrilled-as-darling-makes-return-and-swans-three-points-off-top","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/2022\/10\/08\/martin-thrilled-as-darling-makes-return-and-swans-three-points-off-top\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin thrilled as Darling makes return and Swans three points off top"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One would scarcely believe that just a few weeks ago the Swans would come out of a tough run of games with four wins on the bounce and five victories in six games but that&#8217;s exactly what they&#8217;ve achieved after today&#8217;s success against Sunderland.<\/p>\n<p>It seems a while ago that there were concerns about a possible relegation scrap but that&#8217;s where Russell Martin&#8217;s men were after an underwhelming start with late goals conceded in abundance.<\/p>\n<div class=\"getty aligncenter\"><a id='bJVGoxuIQMZGwgMkhB9TGw' class='gie-single' href='http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1243820334' target='_blank' style='color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;'>Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'bJVGoxuIQMZGwgMkhB9TGw',sig:'Ati44D_-0Mn7Livi-6pp7iethnW59Q6Mw3Gjwz8SV7o=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1243820334',caption: false ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/div>\n<p>But there&#8217;s a new found steel in this Swansea City team and they needed every bit of that against an energetic Sunderland in the second half to further cement their credentials as a team that can perhaps do a bit more than just mid-table this term.<\/p>\n<p>Harry Darling impressed as Martin rang the changes with four in all from the game at Watford and two of those players brought in scored &#8211; showing how important it is to have strength in depth at this level.<\/p>\n<p>Darling and Cooper were on the scoresheet before Jack Clarke pulled one back in a nerve-wracking second half which saw Mowbray&#8217;s men press to little avail.<\/p>\n<p>Martin told Wales Online: &#8220;I&#8217;m really pleased for H. He&#8217;s had to be patient because Woody and Ben have been outstanding.<\/p>\n<div class=\"getty aligncenter\"><a id='e3TjLF72SFhE3UROH2Nz7A' class='gie-single' href='http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1243820223' target='_blank' style='color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;'>Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'e3TjLF72SFhE3UROH2Nz7A',sig:'_E9FWZwmyhbtLYtEfBU1-cOZBaUVaZe2MAawNPdKjl0=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1243820223',caption: false ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/div>\n<p id=\"amp-readmore-target\">&#8220;The same as Kyle [Naughton] in between them who helps us so much with so many aspects of the game, especially the young guys either side of him.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think the most pleasing bit with us from Harry today was how he defended the box in the second-half. He defended really robustly. With some people, it just takes a bit longer to adapt to a different environment and level.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We know what he&#8217;s going to be and what he&#8217;s capable of, but Woody and Ben have just been really top so it&#8217;s been difficult for him. But a brilliant performance, I&#8217;m really pleased for him to score.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re too tired to feel anything at the moment.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m immensely proud of the players, staff and the fans. To get the three wins is an incredible return. If anyone had said at the start of the week that we&#8217;d get nine points, we&#8217;d probably be the only people who would believe we&#8217;d be capable of that.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They&#8217;ve shown immense courage and energy. The last two games certainly showed today in the second-half. We started the game with brilliant energy and were so aggressive. We looked a threat.<\/p>\n<div class=\"getty aligncenter\"><a id='a-ldIkrmQsN7eKFixgE2wg' class='gie-single' href='http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1243817091' target='_blank' style='color:#a7a7a7;text-decoration:none;font-weight:normal !important;border:none;display:inline-block;'>Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'a-ldIkrmQsN7eKFixgE2wg',sig:'aJOTGqWBeAy3q-3d768_WewHrplIK5KHpEPHvrkOmw0=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1243817091',caption: false ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/div>\n<p>&#8220;But we just couldn&#8217;t sustain that energy, it started creeping in in the last 15 minutes of the first-half. They [Sunderland] played on Tuesday, it&#8217;s very different. We got back to the stadium here on Thursday morning at half three, it&#8217;s not easy. That showed, for sure.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The second-half was a bit more painful and I don&#8217;t think we&#8217;re overly satisfied with the performance, apart from the first half an hour. I still thought we had some brilliant moments in the second-half when Olivier [Ntcham] came on and we changed Joel&#8217;s [Piroe] position a bit.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Their goalkeeper has made more saves than Steven [Benda]. They&#8217;re a really good team by the way. I really like them, Sunderland. They&#8217;ll cause a lot of teams problems this year.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The lads showed huge resilience, togetherness, determination and desire to protect what we had. We&#8217;ve won four games in a row in this league, and after the start we had to the season, that&#8217;s no mean feat.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Swansea have a week&#8217;s break now before a tough trip to Burnley.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One would scarcely believe that just a few weeks ago the Swans would come out of a tough run of games with four wins on the bounce and five victories in six games but that&#8217;s exactly what they&#8217;ve achieved after today&#8217;s success against Sunderland. It seems a while ago that there were concerns about a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":459,"featured_media":67522,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[293,49,203],"tags":[740,665],"class_list":["post-70403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-first-team","category-news","category-opinion","tag-sunderland","tag-the-2022-23-season"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/459"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70403\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackarmy.net\/wp67\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}