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Beesotted contributor Dan Leicester Bee Suh puts a Swindon under the microscope

Well, I for one, am refusing to get carried away. There’s no doubt that everything is in our favour. A massive thank you to the Swindon keeper for handing us 3 points on Tuesday and a massive thank you to Sheff Utd for hammering a nail into Rotherham’s chances, but it isn’t over yet.

I am, personally, concerned about our away form. And within the next 5 games, we have 3 away games. And a home game against Preston. As a result, I am not counting my chickens yet, as if Rotherham can bounce back and we lose 3 games, Rotherham will be ahead of us on goal difference. At the moment, draws will help us immensely, but of course, we want wins!!! Despite my nerves, at least we have a team that is massively high quality and as our performance showed against Sheff Utd away from home, we are capable of putting in big performances, even if we didn’t score.

So, onto the Swindon game. Well, we all know that Swindon are a dangerous team. Their form in the first half of the season was very very good. However, in 2014, their form has been remarkably poor, other than a recent run of 3 straight wins. Including that run of 3 wins, they have only won 3 other games in 2014, lost 7 and drawn 7, in all competitions. Basically, they are horribly inconsistent, but they’ve beaten Preston at home recently, halted Sheff Utd’s impressive run, but lost to Wolves, Leyton Orient and Franchise FC aka MK Dons.

In recent form, i.e. the last 8 games, we have won 5, drawn 2 and lost 1. Swindon have won 3, drawn 2 and lost 3.

Our possession is soaring at the moment, with 55.25% possession in our favour. Swindon enjoy possession 50% of the time. More importantly, we are creating an average of 15 chances per game, allowing 8 chances against us, whilst Swindon create 8.38 chances and allow 9.5 chances against them.

Even more importantly, we get 5.75 chances on target, allowing 2.88 on target against us. Swindon get 3.88 chances on target, allowing 3.75 on target against them. With us having scored 10 goals in the last 8, conceding 5 (3 of them in one game against Rotherham), Swindon have scored 8 goals, conceding 10 (although 4 of them were by Wolves).

Our last encounter saw Brentford come through 3-2 winners in the Boxing Day thriller, where we allowed Swindon to get into the game. When we realised that they weren’t all that, we went for their throat. They were a good side that day, and they played very good football. Swindon’s home form is much better than their away form though having picked up 39 points at home, compared to only 18 away from home.

But, their home form since February has been relatively poor. 2 wins, 2 draws and 3 defeats in their league home form is nothing to write home about.

Their top striker Nile Ranger at the time (7 league goals and 2 cup) was sacked from Swindon back in January. Closely followed by N’Guessan (8 league goals) who doesn’t seem to have featured since their Wolves game and Ajose (6 league goals), Nicky Ajose was only on loan with Swindon, and Luongo (6 league goals) was a very tricky player against us on Boxing Day.

They do also have Michael Smith (previously on loan at AFC Wimbledon), who has scored 5 goals since January too. Interestingly, they only have one player with any significant number of assists. Alex Pritchard is on 8 assists in the league. In summary, they don’t have consistency up front (hence why their form in 2014 might be a bit dodgy).

Our concerns at Brentford are that we need Clayton and Trotta to hit most of our goals. They have 28 goals in the league between them, with Forshaw on 8 and Alan Judge on 5. Our assists are still quite low (per player), although we have 30 assists spread throughout 10 players, including Sammy Saunders.

Overall, the stats keep pointing to a win but our away form and our lack of goals is decidedly dodgy. If we put in a performance like we did against Sheffield Utd, then the goals will come. If we play like we did against Rotherham or Oldham, then we simply won’t score. In my opinion, we need the fans to turn out in force and sing the team to victory.

Rotherham play Bradford on Friday night. If they lose, then a win against Swindon virtually seals promotion for us. We would only need 1 more point after that to guarantee promotion. For me, the fans will do just this and we will be looking at a 2-1 win.

Looking at the final fixtures of the season, Wolves still have to face Rotherham and Leyton Orient, with even the Coventry game is a potential banana skin for them. Rotherham have to face Bradford, Wolves, Franchise FC aka MK Dons and Swindon. All are very tricky games.

If we can get wins under our belt, the Wolves vs Rotherham game will work in our favour to the point that we could put Wolves under pressure for the title, or we could have promotion secured by 4.50pm on Good Friday.

First things first though. Let’s go hammer and tong at Swindon and beat them.

Dan Suh
@dansuh_kf