-Credit: (Image: Huw Evans Picture Agency Ltd)
It’s been a while since the mood was this positive at Swansea City.
Tuesday’s win at Plymouth Argyle means they’re now four games unbeaten, sitting in ninth place, with four points separating them from the play-offs ahead of the busy festive schedule of games.
Luke Williams will be keen on building up some further momentum heading into the second half of the season, but his attention may well start to drift further towards the upcoming January transfer window.
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Despite Swansea’s obvious progress on the pitch, there’s clearly still some room for improvement in this squad, and with a new ownership group behind them, the upcoming window is a great opportunity for Andy Coleman and Co to convince supporters that this new era really will be different.
That said, Coleman has already played down the prospect of splashing the cash when the window re-opens, despite the injection of £20m into the club.
“What we’re going to say about January is, we’re always going to go into every window, as I’ve always said, looking to come out stronger than when we went in,” Coleman said recently.
“But January’s a tough market. We all know that. We’re not going to go chasing deals just to chase deals.
“The new investment is coming in to stabilise the economic model of the club first, so that we can take the necessary steps along this road together to improve the club every single window we enter.”
It means that while permanent deals could still happen, the club are likely to lean a little more on the loan market than in the summer, with Nelson Abbey and Myles Peart-Harris the only loan captures from the last window.
A decision over whether to keep Abbey on board will likely be part of the thinking, with the centre-back yet to make a single league appearance since arriving from Olympiakos, who may well conclude that this loan spell isn’t quite working out.
However, that would leave the options at centre-back rather thin going into the second half of the season. Indeed, even with Abbey still on board, there’s a strong case for bringing another central defender in.
Harry Darling and Ben Cabango are both out of contract at the end of the season, and tying them down to new deals would undoubtedly inject another healthy boost of optimism heading into the new year.
Departures could still happen, with several players likely to be made available should the right offer come in. The likes of Nathan Tjoe-a-on, who was on the radar of Oxford United among others in the summer, and Kristian Pedersen, who’s out of contract at the end of the campaign, both fall into that bracket.
Sales of fringe players would clearly be useful, particularly if the club want to strengthen their forward options.
Noel Milleskog is a player who has previously been on the radar, but with his contract running until 2028, the onus will clearly be on Swansea to piece together an acceptable financial package if they wish to revisit a potential move in the winter.
In an ideal world, Swansea would land both a play-maker, perhaps a winger and a new striker to push current number nine Zan Vipotnik.
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January’s a tough market in which to find suitable forward options at the best of times, but having utilised a global scouting network in the summer, there might well be an uncovered gem out there for the club to polish.
What cannot be allowed to happen, is for a big name to go the other way.
Goncalo Franco, Lawrence Vigouroux and Josh Key have all emerged as potential assets this term, and losing any of them would represent a huge body-blow going into the rest of the season.
The financial realities may yet overtake the footballing side of things there, but if Swansea can find a way to keep their best players, and strengthen the squad with a bit of quality in certain areas, this might well be a team worth keeping an eye on over the next few months.