Paul Clement has urged his Swansea City players to crank up the pressure on Hull City by ensuring that the two-point gap between the two relegation-threatened teams does not widen before the final two matches of the season.
Swansea’s manager is aware that his team could be five points adrift by the time they kick-off at home against Everton on Saturday night, with Marco Silva’s side hosting Sunderland earlier in the day, yet he is convinced that his players have “turned a corner” in recent weeks and is confident they can escape the threat of relegation if they win successive home games for the first time in 12 months.
“We’ve got to do the business [against Everton],” Clement said. “Got to get a good result. Got to keep that pressure on. The fact that they’ve then got Crystal Palace and then Tottenham; we’ve got Sunderland and then West Brom … but we’ve got to do the job against Everton, we’ve got to focus on that.”
With Premier League safety Hull’s to lose, Clement talked about the need for Swansea “to use that [situation] to our advantage”.
Clement’s main concern, though, is that his players maintain the standards set in the last two fixtures. “We haven’t spoken about chasing; we’ve just spoken about the need to start performing better, because after the way we played against West Ham and Watford, if we continued playing like that, there was only going to be one outcome.
“Thankfully we have turned that corner and performed well, four points out of Stoke at home and Manchester United away is a good return. And it could have been six points, so now why can’t we go into Everton and take all three points?”
Hull’s match against Sunderland will finish roughly 40 minutes before Swansea kick-off and Clement is realistic enough to know that “everyone is going to know” the result in his dressing room. “Whether Hull win, lose or draw, we’ve still got to win. If they win, we’ve got to keep the gap the same. If they draw or lose, we’ve got to take advantage, so it stays the same for us,” he said.
Clement is expected to retain the midfield diamond that has served Swansea well, which means Jordan Ayew will once again partner Fernando Llorente up front. Ayew is still looking for his first goal since arriving from Aston Villa in January, yet the Ghanaian has impressed alongside Llorente, with Clement reporting that the striker’s “physical statistics were almost off the chart” against Stoke and saying they were “the same again against Man United”.
“He’s come close [to a goal],” Clement added. “He had two good opportunities against Stoke. There was one where it hit the inside of [Jack] Butland’s heel and on any other day that would have gone in. At Man United he had a couple of good chances. I’m sure that will come and it will be the icing on the cake because he’s doing a lot of things right.”