Having run Tottenham close at the Liberty, Swansea could well give Spurs a fright
Heading into tomorrow's match Tottenham & Swansea must be poles apart in terms of their confidence based on recent results. Spurs are without a win in five, whereas the Swans boast back to back victories and despite the London side having home advantage, Garry Monk's men will be quietly confident of springing an upset.
Spurs' developing cut-throatery under Pochettino has seemed to have waned over the last few weeks. At the risk of imbuing another Chelsea-style drubbing they don't seem to have the same zip and vigour in their pressing which, after an arduous season challenging on multiple fronts, is only natural.
Intensity in winning the ball back is a staple of Pochettino's system, and if we can restrict their ability to put pressure on our defenders by making sure our midfielders show for the ball, and are brave in offering themselves with opposition markers nearby, we could strike on the counter-attack.
Having previously predicted the Swans would "revert to type" against Burnley only for us, once again, to go with a narrower formation intended to restrict the opposition, it's difficult to predict how we'll line up tomorrow. Go narrow and we run the risk of Spurs' full-backs overlapping - which they'll surely do to greater effect than Burnley. Go wide and we may find ourselves overrun in the middle. It's a balancing act and Monk will no doubt have pondered this exact question after Burnley celebrations subsided.
Swansea have struggled against big powerful strikers in the past (Carroll...) but Kane should, in theory, be manageable. It is likely that we'll play our more defensive formation, and with Cork in particular excelling in the air since being brought in (winning 3.3 aerial duels per game - one more than nearest challenger Ashley Williams) we should be able to make it difficult for Spurs to build anything through the middle.
Don't forget it took a late Christian Eriksen strike to separate the sides back in December. We weren't outclassed, and Spurs' win sparked a seven-game unbeaten run, of which they won five. While they'll be hoping to once again kickstart their season with another victory over Garry Monk's side, we've shown in the last two games that we aren't going to go down without a fight. Not since Chelsea, anyway.
Will it be pretty? Probably not. But whoever wins, their fans won't care. I'm fancying a cheeky 2-1 away win to complete a famous hat-trick of victories heading into the international break, which would leave us just one point behind Tottenham.
We'll have played a game more, but the lowest position we could slip to even if we manage to lose would be tenth. With ten games left to play after tomorrow's match at White Hart Lane, that's a bloody lovely position to be in.