Swansea City

Image source, Huw Evans Picture Agency

Swansea City fear Kyle Naughton suffered a significant hamstring injury during Saturday’s south Wales derby victory over Cardiff City.

Naughton, 35, has enjoyed his best run of the season in recent weeks, with his composure at right-back helping Swansea win three of their last five league games.

But the long-serving Naughton, whose contract expires this summer, was forced off just before the hour mark as Swansea beat the Bluebirds 2-0.

“We are gutted,” said Swansea boss Luke Williams.

“I don’t know the extent of it yet but it doesn’t look good and this guy is incredible.

“I hope it is on the less severe side but we’ll see.”

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Luke Williams says neither Swansea City nor Cardiff City go into today's south Wales derby as favourites.

The Bluebirds head into the match on the back of four successive wins while the Swans collected seven points from three games prior to defeat at Bristol City last Sunday.

But Williams says form is not particularly relevant ahead of the meeting between the sides at the Swansea.com Stadium.

“Cardiff have been in good form. But I think it’s fair to say the form is not the most important thing in this fixture, and it’s also fair to say we are in relatively good form ourselves," he said.

“I don’t think there are favourites in this game. I think it is more difficult to call the game on numbers because there is so much emotion involved.”

Swansea sit just five points above the Championship's relegation zone ahead of the contest with Erol Bulut's outfit.

And Williams hopes a victory over Cardiff combined with the chance to work during the upcoming international break can provide the Swans with a platform to finish the campaign strongly.

“There’s still a fair amount of games left and we intend to be finishing very strongly," added the Swans boss.

"This game is different, we have to just concentrate only on this game, then we have a small break and we’ll prepare for the remaining fixtures.”

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Former Cardiff and Swansea defender Steven Caulker says the South Wales derby is spoken about “all around the UK”.

Caulker played for both Welsh sides and scored the winning goal in the fixture for the Bluebirds in 2013.

“It’s a game everyone wants to watch. I remember playing in League One at Yeovil and the south Wales derby was taking place and everyone on the bus was checking the score, everyone was shouting out who’s scored and who hasn’t and who they’re predicting to win the game, so it is something that’s spoken about all around the UK and it’s a game which I’m very much looking forward to watching this weekend,” Caulker said.

“In the south Wales derby [in 2013], we played in the Premier League at home in Cardiff for the first game, the atmosphere was intense but I actually felt there were quite a lot of nerves around the stadium in all honesty.

“Our first season in the Premier League, there was lots of excitement, lots of hope for the year that lie ahead, but that particular game I just remember it being really tense until I scored. The place just erupted and then it was back to the pressure of ‘can we hold on?’

“There was similar kind of eruption at the final whistle, there was definitely a different atmosphere to other games in the sense that there were a lot nerves. It’s a game that neither side wants to lose”.

Caulker played every game of Cardiff City’s 2013-14 season in the top flight and played on loan at Swansea from Tottenham in the Swans' first Premier League campaign in 2011-12.

But the former England international says his time in west Wales made his derby goal celebration more muted than usual.

“I’ve still got my man of the match award upstairs, I treasure it. It was a special, special moment. It was slightly strange in the sense that I’d scored in the derby, but I couldn’t celebrate, I still had a lot of respect for Swansea," Caulker added.

“I instantly put my arm in the air because I’d just scored a goal and then realised it’s against Swansea. I put my arm down and ran over to Craig Bellamy and had a fairly mild celebration, but definitely the feeling was unbelievable .

“I’m going to go for a draw [this weekend] and I’m not just saying that to sit on the fence. Cardiff are coming in to it in better form, but Swansea are the home side and I expect to see a couple of goals. I’m going to go for 2-2”.

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The stakes are always high when it comes to the South Wales derby, especially for managers.

Because the last decade of meetings between Swansea City and Cardiff City have shown it is not just bragging rights on the line for bosses in this fixture – it is their jobs.

A remarkable statistic circulated on social media this week, pointing out that Erol Bulut will become the first Cardiff manager to take charge of both derby fixtures in a season since the days of Dave Jones.

But the derby dugout quirk goes further, showing that the last 11 managers to have lost this fixture have not been in place by the time the next derby comes around.

And again you have to go back to Jones’ time in charge of the Bluebirds for the last boss to have been beaten in a derby and still be in the job for the return match.

That came in November 2010 when Marvin Emnes’ goal inflicted a home defeat on Cardiff, only for a Jones-led side to get revenge at the Liberty Stadium three months later via a Craig Bellamy beauty.

Brendan Rodgers was the Swans boss that day but had left for Liverpool by the time the teams renewed rivalries in the Premier League in 2013.

And so the derby ‘curse’ continued with Michael Laudrup and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer both losing games and being removed from their posts by the time the sides met again in the Championship in 2019.

There, Swansea wins under Steve Cooper saw both Neil Warnock and Neil Harris depart before the next fixture rolled around - with a goalless draw in between providing a stay of execution.

And when Cooper’s Swans were upset at home by Mick McCarthy’s Bluebirds, the Welshman had moved on before McCarthy’s trip west the following season.

The man who replaced Cooper, Russell Martin, then proceeded to oversee four straight derby wins against four different Cardiff managers, with McCarthy, Steve Morison, Mark Hudson and Sabri Lamouchi all only managing one derby each.

And while Martin left the fixture unbeaten when he joined Southampton, the curse continued when Michael Duff lasted 11 weeks after a comfortable Cardiff win last September following Bulut’s arrival.

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Saturday marks Luke Williams' turn to try out just how high the stakes are, although he has sampled the passions as part of Martin’s victorious coaching staff.

Meanwhile Bulut has the chance to engineer a first ever Cardiff double in the fixture – something that would no doubt add to the voices backing him for a new contract beyond the summer.

But if history is anything to go by, if there is a winner on Saturday, only one will be around by the next time the South Wales rivals go head to head.

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Luke Williams says calmness is key for Swansea City after they failed to find the target at Bristol City.

The Swans were beaten for the first time in four matches thanks to Rob Dickie’s 73rd-minute header at Ashton Gate.

It was a game of few chances, although Swansea looked the more likely scorers in the first half and saw Przemyslaw Placheta and Ollie Cooper miss second-half opportunities.

Not for the first time in his brief Swansea reign, Williams has called for more composure in the final third as preparations begin for next Saturday’s south Wales derby against Cardiff City.

“We are talking about moments in games where we make the wrong decision on the final pass, the wrong connection to strike the ball,” he said.

“We are talking about small margins. We went to the box plenty of times [at Bristol City] but we fluffed our lines somewhat. It’s not like we didn’t cause any threat.

“We need to be a bit more calm, to have a bit more precision in the final third.”