Swansea V West Ham at Liberty Stadium : Match Preview

25 August 2012 08:11
Britton: QPR rout was a one-off

Leon Britton has warned Swansea they must keep their feet on the ground when they face West Ham at the Liberty Stadium. Michael Laudrup's side made a dream start to the new campaign with a crushing 5-0 win at QPR last weekend and lie third in the Barclays Premier League table. The manner of the win, coming at a ground where Swansea had never beaten their opponents, means there is a keen sense of anticipation ahead of the first home meeting of the season against Sam Allardyce's Hammers. But former West Ham midfielder Britton knows results like that at QPR will not be the norm, and with the visitors having also started their campaign with a win, against Aston Villa, he knows the Swans will need to be on their game. He said: "Last week's result was a one-off. It's the sort of thing that happens once in every 20 or 30 games when everything goes for you. "Every shot you have goes in, every tackle is made and every block is made and they fail to take their chances. You don't get carried away as you will get punished on Saturday. "We have experienced players in the squad who will keep our feet on the ground and obviously the manager and staff will make sure of it. "But if you get too far ahead of yourself we will lose on Saturday, there is no doubt about it." Defender Chico Flores is a fitness doubt for the Swans. The centre-half has a groin problem and will undergo a fitness test, with Alan Tate, Garry Monk and Kyle Bartley all potential replacements if he is unavailable. Striker Itay Shechter will miss out as Swansea are still awaiting the completion of the paperwork for his loan move from Kaiserslautern. South Korea international Ki Sung-yeung is set to join for a club record fee but will not be included in the squad, but Scott Sinclair will feature again despite electing not to sign a new contract with the south Wales club. 

Meanwhile, Sam Allardyce is expecting a difficult challenge. "What impressed me most was the quality of the finishing," he said of the Swans' crushing win. "Apart from the first goal - Robert (Green, QPR goalkeeper) knows he should have stopped it - the others were all quality goals. That should thrill Michael. "To finish with that quality means you've got goals in your team and we've got to nullify that on Saturday, and not allow those spaces to occur for those players to have those chances." It took Swansea until January to record an away win in the league last season but, following their mauling of QPR, Allardyce has said his side will be ready to take advantage of any over-confidence among the Swansea players. He said: "I don't know (if they will suffer from over-confidence), I hope so because if there is we may be able to take advantage of that. But somehow I don't think there will be. "Everybody found it a hugely difficult task to beat them at their ground. On the back of them trying to continue that, and their magnificent result against QPR, it will be a tough, tough match." That tough task could be made slightly easier on West Ham following the club-record signing of winger Matt Jarvis. The 26-year-old moved from Wolves for a fee believed to be in the region of £10.75million, including add-ons. Allardyce has confirmed he is now unlikely to move for any more players despite having back-ups in place in case the Jarvis deal did not go ahead. When asked if he expected any more signings, Allardyce said: "Not at this moment in time. We had a couple of players lined up that were from abroad in case the Matt transfer didn't come off. "We have obviously now said `thanks but we can't go in that area any more'. We wait and see as always going into the mayhem of next week what might turn up, of course." Midfielder Jack Collison (knee) remains sidelined while Alou Diarra and Modibo Maiga are in contention to break into the starting XI. 

Source: PA