2017/18 Premier League Preview Swansea City
Having won promotion to the Premier League in 2010/11, Swansea City have established themselves as a good Premier League team.
However, that nearly all came crashing down around them last season as they went very close to being relegated back to the Championship. The final league table shows Swansea in 15th place and 7 points clear of the relegation zone but the season was much more desperate than those statistics suggest.
Swansea spent 18 weeks of the 2016/17 Premier League season in the relegation zone. With only three matches of the season remaining they were in the relegation zone but a run of four wins and a draw in their last five games lifted them clear in a dramatic end to the season.
Paul Clement has had a full preseason with this team, having come in midway through last season and will be hoping to keep Swansea away from the bottom three during the 2017/18 Premier League campaign.
One of the major factors in the success of Swansea’s season is the future of Gylfi Sigurdsson. The Icelandic international has been a hugely influential player at the Liberty Stadium since joining from Tottenham Hotspur.
Sigurdsson has scored 34 goals in 121 league games and produced 13 assists last season, an output Swansea would sorely miss if he left the club. Everton have been strongly linked with the player and Sigurdsson is 1/7 to be with the Toffees come the end of the summer transfer window and 4/1 to remain with Swansea.
This suggests Sigurdsson is on his way out of the club and if so, Swansea could be in for another difficult season at the bottom of the table. They are priced at just 2/1 to be relegated come the end of the 2017/18 Premier League campaign and these odds will probably shorten further if Sigurdsson leaves the club.
Spanish midfielder Roque Mesa has been Swansea’s biggest signing of the summer, joining for £11.25 million from Las Palmas. They have also brought in Tammy Abraham on loan from Chelsea which is an interesting addition to the squad.
The 19-year-old striker has scored 3 goals in preseason, having missed the first two friendly matches. With Fernando Llorente set to miss the opening day of the season with a broken arm, Abraham is in line to play that match and will be looking to continue his good start to life at Swansea.
Abraham is 5/4 to finish the season as Swansea’s top goal scorer and 33/1 to scoop the young player of the year award.
The first thought going into this season must be to avoid relegation and if they do, a bottom half finish is the most likely outcome. Swansea are 1/8 to finish in the bottom half of the Premier League table.
If they can keep hold of Sigurdsson, which seems unlikely and Abraham scores goals, they may have an outside chance of a top half finish but as the odds of 13/2 suggest, this is very doubtful.
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