Ivor, great post. I was up at the game yesterday and i thought it was a poor performance from BOTH teams, i got the feeling that it was a tactical thing by Laudrup to keep the ball for long periods, i think he is concerned about us being burnt out by the time the end of January comes around. It looked like a tired showing from our guys and it didnt help that reading were also poor, i felt the Swans were only looking to exert the energy required to keep parity, it was high risk and a dis allowed goal could have cost us. Swansea looked like a team that was waiting for the season to end which was crazy considering what is at stake this season. Im aware we cant play well all the time but surely these are the games we should be giving maximum effort to? Laudrup knew this was the game to target,same away at Southampton,yet the same result produced itself. It is clear that we cannot maintain high performance levels in this league, that does come with squad size, Michu getting injured was only a matter of time,the guy has become our only focal point and that aint a good thing! The only positives were that we seem to play crap and still get something from these games where under rodgers we would have lost at Southampton,reading home and away,sunderland at home etc. Considering reading were looking to kick start their season they were even worse than us!! i can forgive our boys being tired after the Man Utd game but in all honesty they need to start looking at teams around us as their "cup finals" not the teams in the top four!! keeping teams like reading down there is vitally important, we need to maintain a safe gap and not get dragged into any kind of relelgation battle. I have never been one to think we are Europe bound, there is far to much work to be done for me, we are 2/3 injuries away from everything collapsing and getting points on the board at places like reading is critical. All in all i was dissapointed with the game but thankful for the point
The way we were playing, it struck me that ML was happy to take a point or hoping for a breakaway winner. Could be the same against Fulham - and that he is targeting a win against Aston Villa. 6 points out of 12 over Xmas and New Year wouldn't be too bad.
