It’s been a busy summer so far in Swindon with 12 players leaving the County Ground and eight coming in, but can Richie Wellens lead Town to success this season?
The Robins will certainly feel the loss of Matthew Taylor, the Journeyman calling time on his career which begun last century, when he broke through into Luton Town’s senior side in 1999. Taylor was a player renowned for his set-piece deliveries and will probably be best remembered for his spectacular 45-yard volley for Portsmouth against Everton back in 2006. Despite his age of 37, Taylor played a key part in Swindon’s campaign last season, with 35 appearances in all competitions, and filling that void is no mean feat for Wellens.
Olly Lancashire is another Town player leaving Wiltshire, the centre-half moving north to join David Artell’s Crewe Alexandria, replacing captain George Ray who joined Tranmere. Lancashire featured in almost every game until the start of December but was never favoured by Wellens – who did not start the club captain for a single game. Of the 21 league games Lancashire featured in, the Robins picked up 30 points averaging 1.43 points per game. Contrastingly, they only picked up 1.36 points per game without the Englishman.
Wellens has brought in a couple of centre-backs to compete with Dion Conroy and Tom Broadbent, including the highly-rated Arsenal youngster, Daniel Ballard. This will be the 19-year old’s first stint in the EFL but he’s made 56 appearances for Arsenal’s youth set up and featured in every game of the FA Youth Cup in 2018, where the young Gunners came second to a Chelsea side that included £40 million rated winger Callum Hudson-Odoi.
Town’s full-back options have been given a boost with the acquisition of Zeki Fryers from Barnsley, who plays predominantly on the left.
After coming through the Manchester United academy, Fryers, bizarrely, moved to Standard Liege and made seven appearances in the Belgian Pro League and then moved back to the Premier League to Tottenham, where he played 16 times before making a £5 million switch to Crystal Palace. That would turn out to be his last taste of Premier League action, as Fryers was loaned to Rotherham and Ipswich before moving to Barnsley, suffering relegation in his maiden season at Oakwell. He only made eight appearances last season and is in need of a spark to reignite his career. With this to be his first season in the basement division of the EFL, can he find success at the County Ground?
Swindon signed Theo Robinson on loan from Southend in January, and fans will surely be hoping they can negotiate a deal with the Shrimpers for his permanent signature. The 30-year-old scored seven in 16 appearances for the Robins, helping to turn around their form and finish the season strong.
However, with the loan signing of Jerry Yates from Rotherham – have Swindon already got their man? Yates is a young player at 22 and enjoyed a relatively successful loan period with mid-table Carlisle during the last campaign, earning him a recall to the Millers where he then featured six times in the Championship. Will Yates be the man to fire Swindon to the play-offs? I’m not so sure, however, if Wellens can bring in someone like Robinson to play alongside Yates, it could be a different story.
The bookies have Swindon neither here nor there, with a mid-table finish the predicted outcome. With the adjustments to the squad thus far, it is difficult to envisage a play-off push for the Robins with a proven goalscorer still needed.
