Sports Blog 18/12/2017: Premier League Preview – Everton vs Swansea, Monday 18th December 2017

Can Swansea keep their hopes of staying up alive by beating Everton, at 8pm on Sky Sports?

The bottom half of the table is so crowded that only 6 points separates 20th place Swansea and 12th place Southampton. It’d become even tighter if Paul Clement’s side picked up all 3 points on Monday night, a result that would take them to 18th or 19th dependant on the size of the victory. In other words, there are a lot of bad teams about at the moment, meaning Swansea – who have 3 wins, 3 draws and a nasty 11 losses – still have more than a reasonable chance of remaining in the top flight.



Granted, if they are to do so then someone needs to start scoring – with just 9 goals in 17 games Swansea have far and away the worst attack in the league. Tammy Abraham has 4 of those goals, and a Super Mega PGM of 16-20, while Wilfried Bony, with 2, has a spread of 17-21. Defensively, however, Swansea are relatively solid; despite being at the bottom of the table, they’ve conceded fewer goals than every side outside the top 7 (admittedly having played one game less).

If Swansea are searching for an example of how to escape their current predicament, then they arguably need look no further than their hosts. At the end of October Everton were in 18th place, were lacking a full-time manager and had won 2 league games in 10. Yet since appointing Sam Allardyce at the end of November they’re unbeaten in 4, with a 4-0 win and 2-0 wins over West Ham and Huddersfield, a 1-1 draw at Liverpool and, most recently, a narrow 1-0 victory at Newcastle.

Wayne Rooney especially seems to have been invigorated since Big Sam took the reins at Goodison Park. The former England captain has scored 5 goals in his last 4 league games – more than doubling his season’s tally – including a hat-trick against the Hammers. Rooney heads into Monday night at a Super Mega PGM of 32-38, ahead of Oumar Niasse at 25-30 and Dominic Calvert-Lewin at 20-24.

The Toffees are on the up and up, and can actually leap into 9th place with a win on Monday; they sit at an Everton/Swansea Goal Supremacy spread of 0.65-0.85 alongside a Total Goals spread of 2.2-2.4.