Preview | Swansea City v Bristol City
Swansea City host Bristol City in the final Championship fixture before the international break this afternoon (12.30pm) with head coach Michael Duff looking for his side to put together the positive elements of recent showings against the Robins.
With the transfer window having closed late on Friday night, all focus turns to on-field matters as the hosts seek a first league win of the season, having shown positive signs in narrow defeats to Preston and Premier League Bournemouth in the last seven days.
They host a Bristol City side who have picked up four of their five points accumulated so far while on their travels.
TEAM NEWS
Michael Duff has no new injury worries following the midweek Carabao Cup clash with Bournemouth, other than a couple of knocks he is expecting players to come from.
The likes of Josh Ginnelly, Joe Allen and Kyle Naughton featured prominently against the Cherries and will be hoping to force their way into the starting line-up.
Deadline-day signings Kristian Pedersen, Josh Tymon, Bashir Humphreys and Jamal Lowe will have a watching brief as they were not registered in time for this fixture.
PRE-MATCH VIEW
Michael Duff: “They have good players, as do all teams in this league. People like Nahki Wells - I actually played against Nahki, so it shows how long he has been around for - who knows where the goal is.
“They have players that can hurt you, but ultimately we are looking to do what we have done in the last two games, but stitch those elements together into one.
“With the ball we want to be as good as we were for the first hour at Preston, and be as good without it as we were against Bournemouth the other night.
“That’s the challenge for us. We want to see things coming out in games, we have been the better team in recent games but we have not come out on the right side of the stat that matters.
“We can see progression, but we want to make sure those key moments start going in our favour.”
Nigel Pearson: "It's always a different challenge when you go away from home in this league, and we have had a couple of very good performances which have given us points on the road.
"That's been good, but we need to go to Swansea and make sure we play as well as we can play.
"We have had a couple of positive results and I feel the players are looking forward to the game, and are keen to make sure we go into the international break on the back of a positive.That's the main thing really.
"Swansea have some new personnel, but they remain a possession-based side. I like Michael (Duff), he is a good guy.
"We have had some tough games at Swansea, so it's about making sure our performance is right."
TODAY'S REFEREE
Oliver Langford is the man in the middle for this afternoon's game and you can find out more about him and his team of officials below.
REMEMBER THE LAST TIME?
Goals from Liam Cullen and Olivier Ntcham saw Swansea City deservedly return to winning ways with victory over Bristol City when the Robins last visited the Swansea.com Stadium in March.
Swansea had much the better of the opening half and claimed the lead when Cullen steered in his seventh goal of the season 11 minutes before the break.
Joel Piroe hit the post early in the second half, but Ntcham made sure of the points when he showed great composure to convert his sixth goal of the campaign.
It was no less than Swansea deserved, as they got the reward for an improved showing.
PRIME NUMBERS
7 - Swansea City are unbeaten in seven of their last eight league meetings with Bristol City, winning four and drawing three of those games.
34 - No Championship player has come out on top in more individual duels than Swansea's Josh Key, whose tally so far this season stands at 34.