Swansea crave end to self-inflicted slump after parade of exits

Welsh club responded to grim run by moving on their head coach after club captain's departure. But what now?

- Dominic Booth

Football, especially in the cutthroat and crazy Championship, has a habit of making very little sense very quickly. How can a club change their director of football and head coach days after the January transfer window has shut? How can that same club sell their captain, a midfield stalwart, late in the window and fail to replace him? Swansea fans have been asking themselves these questions.

The Swans have been plunged into crisis, with the sacking of the head coach, Luke Williams, on Monday coming after a run containing seven defeats in nine league games. Those results, which included alarmingly heavy defeats by Portsmouth, Norwich and, most painfully, their south Wales rivals Cardiff, meant they slumped from the brink of the playoffs to 17th, with a relegation fight possible.

The nosedive in form prompted the chairman, Andy Coleman - who heads a consortium that acquired majority ownership in November - to act decisively. "This was a difficult decision and one that has not been taken lightly," said Coleman, who less than a week earlier heralded the arrival of Richard Montague as the director of football.

Montague had been an ally of Williams at Notts County, the pair overseeing promotion to the Football League in 2023, and champions a data-driven approach to recruitment. Yet one day before Montague officially started at Swansea, Williams was gone. It's fair to say this was not the plan.