Football Season Guide

Swansea survived a turbulent last season and with coach Paul Clement bringing definite improvement in the displays since his arrival in January, now the Whites will be hoping to enjoy a trouble-free campaign in the middle of the table. Clement was very active back in January when he signed several players that helped their push for survival a lot but so far this summer, he has been a bit passive in strengthening the squad. The main new arrival is playmaker Roque Mesa, who is expected to possibly replace Gylfi Sigurdsson in the number ten role. The Icelander is eager to leave Swansea and Clement only demands the right amount of money to be offered to let him go. Even with Mesa in the squad Swansea will struggle in the creative part of the game if their main playmaker leaves and with this very likely to happen before the end of August, it will be important to monitor how Clement will spend the money his transfer will bring. The gaffer used the off-season to offload some players that were not featuring in his plans, amongst which Jordi Amat, Bafetimbi Gomis, Jack Cork and Borja Baston. The departure of Borja means that Clement is happy to trust his giant striker Fernando Llorente and his January signing Jordan Ayew to provide the goals, although he also added the bright young talent Tammy Abraham, who has tremendous speed. Luciasno Narsingh is also expected to play an important role down the wings after scoring some crucial goals in the spring. Swansea had serious problems defensively last term, but Clement is yet to sign a new player in that part of the pitch and he is obviously happy to trust those in hand and see if they can do better this year. Alfie Mawson flourished under the new manager and he will be the pillar at the back, with Martin Olsson and Kyle Naughton tipped to be the preferred options at full-back.