By Alun Rhys Chivers
Central midfielder Sam Clucas was among the first of the Swans’ players to hail the impact of new manager Carlos Carvalhal since his arrival little over a week ago.
And a revelation made by the Portuguese man during his weekly media duties suggests a mutual respect and admiration for each other, long before the manager left the South Yorkshire club on Christmas Eve and was appointed at the Liberty just four days later.
Carvalhal disclosed that he had attempted to lure Clucas to Sheffield Wednesday from Hull City during the second season of his two-and-a-half year reign at Hillsborough. But the Owls’ target spread his wings and headed for Swansea for a fee believed to be around £15 million last August, although he had also attracted the attention of several Premier League and Championship clubs as a versatile player known to be able to fill most positions on the field.
“He did really well when he was at Hull City,” said Carvalhal. “I really liked him a lot. He played a lot of roles, Snodgrass on one side and him on the other side at that time and then the next season, he started to play more inside the pitch.
“He did really well. I tried to bring him to my team after the next season but it was completely impossible but I tried.”
Not the best start
Sam Clucas got off to a fairly poor start at the Liberty at the beginning of this season, and he’s come in for some pretty hard-hitting words of criticism from Swans fans as the team struggles to get off the bottom of the Premier League table and into safety with less than half their games now remaining.
In his fifteen games thus far, he’s scored just once and has failed to reach the dizzy heights expected of him, having been brought in to plug the gap left by last season’s goal machine Gylfi Sigurdsson.
Twitter spat
Carlos Carvalhal has lept to Sam Clucas’ defence at a time when he’s received some pretty sickening abuse on Twitter as a result of his lacklustre performances. After the Spurs game, Tomos Rhys Watson raged: “I would actually pay a Spurs player to snap Clucas in half.”
Responding – calmly – to the message and subsequent apology, Clucas replied: “Causes such mayhem because you think saying it behind a keyboard you can get away with saying what you want. Happily comment on my performances your entitled to your opininion but don’t be wishing footballers injuries especially when they play for the club your meant to support!”
‘I expect better’
Carlos Carvalhal added: “This season when he started, that was far away from the level he can play. He showed something in the second half of the last game. I think he showed more of the real him. It’s that kind of Clucas that we need. That’s the beginning, to try to improve, because he must do much better. It’s our expectation that he can play at that level because in the past, he was really far away from the player that I know.”