I think Morris definitely has the level of talent to perform in and perhaps even to perform above the Championship. That being said, I tend to be wary of the fortunes of American players in England.
Mostly the manager, of course. But, you know, probably Ayew along with him, and the anti-Americanism of the club that signed an American, and it's American owner. Basic rules apply.
Are we already jumping to this stage of YA reactions? Stage 1: Breathless euphoria. Stage 2: Unrealitistically good expectations. Stage 3: Unrealistically bad expectations. Stage 4. Rage and blame-casting. Stage 5: More Rage and questioning the soccer gods. Stage 6: death ( of hope) and hatred of all things involving (insert name of club here).
Tough to say what realistic expectations would be for this move. His status in the US team where he is penciled in as a starter would seem to show that he should easily be at or above Championship level as we have plenty of guys getting minutes at or above this level. I guess if he is one of the better US attackers, he should at least be able to win a starting spot at Swansea in short order. Then again, we've never seen him playing regularly in another league so you never know how it will go. But, while he is in a new league that is likely the equal of his old one or thereabouts, after an adjustment period he should be able to succeed there. So what? Say a starter within 2 months and 3-4 goals by season's end? What would being successful look like, or failure? I think we certainly have to give more time to make any sort of judgements, don't get me wrong. But, at some point, he will need to succeed and make a bit of a splash to meet even modest expectations. I will be pretty surprised if he doesn't start seeing increases in his minutes pretty quickly since he's had a couple weeks to settle now.
Lowe and Ayew are averaging a goal every 221 and 276 minutes, respectively. Given the settling in period and ramping up to full fitness, my expectation is that he starts producing in that range soon, but is doing better than that by the end of the season.
Yeah, outpacing the competition would sound like a good way to measure it to me. If he wants starts, I'd think he needs to show he's better than what they have.
A 🚀 from @JmoSmooth13! pic.twitter.com/z4bJAYyAbo— Swansea City AFC (@SwansOfficial) February 3, 2021 so smooth
well, he needs to win a starting spot cause the way they sub hes gonna about 30 combined minutes on the season from the bench.
Limited subs and rotation is an interesting strategy when you're set to play 50 games in a season. We'll see how it works out for them. Anyway, massive 6 pointer coming up on Friday for Swansea against top of the table Norwich. Brentford have temporarily moved a point ahead of Swansea into that last automatic promotion spot with their win today against Bristol City, so Swansea don't want to start falling behind. If Swansea can manage a win against Norwich, they will jump back into 2nd (temporarily at least), and will be only two points behind Norwich with an extra game in hand.
THat's one challenge of going on loan to a winning team--they don't have a need to change it up. Contrast with Richards, joining a team in a sorry state at his position.
He's starting on the bench, as one would expect. There was some advanced hype for this game because of its YA potential. But with all 3 players being recent acquisitions, and Swans' reluctance to sub, the over-under on minutes was about 15 (Morris off bench).
Swans go up 1-0 (42nd minute) thru Andre Ayew. Uncharacteristic howler by the pristine Tim Krul. He simply dropped an uncontested corner to the Swans and Ayew turned it in. Good for Morris' prospects of promotion, not so much for his inclusion in this match. Though Lowe missed a shot on the break I think Jordan would hit the majority of time.
2-0 Swans. What a rip by Hourihane. Took it down well and drilled it in the corner from 25 yards. Excellent addition to Swans so far. Morris won't be NEEDED the way this is going, but if the score remains it may provide comfort to bring him in late. Edit: Actually Ayew's been moving around gingerly since a first half knock & he's older. It's hurting Swans' press. So that may be a path for Morris' entrance.
I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the pitch and of the play. Looked like Morris will need to get use to the speed of play.
Morris was robbed of a penalty after playing a thru ball to a teammate which he couldn't handle under pressure but Morris recovered. Played the ball past the opponent to be in on goal, but got his legs clattered. Here's from the Norwich beat guy even: That's probably a penalty, to be honest. Morris gets in front of Gibson and the legs tangle.Meanwhile at the other end, Norwich look like they could be trying for a lot longer than the next 7mins before they score.⏱️84 | 🦢 2-0 🔰#NCFC #EFL #SWANOR— Michael Bailey (@michaeljbailey) February 5, 2021 Overall did pretty well seeing out another 2 goal lead. Hustled to slow down Norwich's attack, created a couple chances, & won balls in the air. But you could see he's not match fit. Hands on knees toward the end, in spite of only playing 15-20 minutes. So hard to see him starting any time soon w/ the lack of fitness and Swans doing so well. Norwich, Swans, & Brentford have an equal shot at auto promotion mathematically. But Swans & Brentford are trending up.
Morris needs to be loaned out to find minutes! Swansea aren't starting him! Maybe to a League 1 side or Belgium!