Paul Clement has admitted Swansea City are going in only one direction – downwards – if they continue to play at the base level they offered during their 1-0 home defeat to Brighton on Saturday.
The Swans manager did not try to mask his team’s deficiencies as they slipped to a fifth home defeat in six matches, but refused to classify the current situation as a crisis – if only because they are one point from safety with 27 matches still to go.
But there is no doubt that the club will be relegated if their form over the remaining matches reflects that shown in the 11 games so far.
Although England call-up Tammy Abraham went close to scoring on a couple of occasions and Luciano Narsingh hit the bar in stoppage time, Swansea drew a blank at home for the third time at home in the Premier League this season.
They were booed off the pitch by their supporters at the end of the first-half after falling behind to Glenn Murray’s goal and again at full-time after failing to grab an equaliser and Clement suggested that his players are bereft of confidence at home.
He said: “Another narrow defeat, it’s the sixth game that we’ve lost by the odd goal but my first reflection on that performance is that if you play at that level, you can’t be expected to win a Premier League game. The standard that we’re playing at is much higher than that and for me that’s the most disappointing thing.
“When I see the team play here at home, I see players who are clearly affected by the first goal going in, the confidence of the team and individual players is low, things are not being done at a basic level and that’s a consequence of the confidence of the group at the moment.
“We can’t make excuses, our job is to deal with difficult situations and we have to work hard, even harder than we are at the moment, to get this right.”
Swansea’s defeat, coupled with Bournemouth’s 1-0 win over Newcastle, means that they have slipped into the relegation zone and their next match is against in-form Burnley at Turf Moor after the international break.
Their fans’ growing anger was vented at the board as well as the players. Clement’s side have mustered only 21 efforts on goal in their 11 games and only bottom-placed Crystal Palace have scored fewer than the Swans’ paltry return of seven.
“The fans are frustrated, they’re showing it,” added Clement. “It’s not the first time they’ve showed it, but today they showed it more ferociously. But no one is more disappointed and frustrated by the levels of performance than I am.
“If we play at that level, we can’t be expected to get a point, never mind a win. A lot of the players in this group have been in this situation before and we have belief we can get out of it,” he added.
“But we don’t want this continuing, we have to do something about it. We might have to win ugly in to get results. There are lots of games so it’s not a crisis but we need to start winning games.”
Chris Hughton promised Brighton would not be getting carried away after success them into eighth place in the Premier League. Murray’s 29th-minute goal secured the win and gave Brighton their first back-to-back wins in the top flight since 1983.
Brighton’s previous away game was a 3-0 win at West Ham and the Seagulls have now lost only once in six league matches, with Lewis Dunk and Ireland’s Shane Duffy the foundations for their success with some commanding performances.