As confirmed by Swansea’s official website, left-back Martin Olsson is out for the remainder of the season with a ruptured Achilles.
The injury suffered by Olsson came in last weekend’s game against Brentford and the Swans have confirmed a surgical procedure was “successful” and that the Swedish defender “begins a long rehabilitation process and will not play again in 2018-19.
Olsson came into English football after signing for Blackburn’s Under-18s back in January 2006. A £2.7million move to Norwich followed seven years later, before Swansea brought him to the Liberty Stadium for around £4.1million in mid-January 2017.
The 47-cap international has featured in 17 of Swansea’s games this season as they look to regather and react to relegation from the Premier League. Currently the South Wales side sit a disappointing 12th in the table, seven points shy of the play-off picture.
With the Swans looking at a seven-point deficit, losing a player of Olsson’s calibre is bound to hurt them as they look to navigate the notoriously tricky and game-packed festive period. It is a period of football where fixtures fly thick and fast, where sides need every hand on deck that they can muster.
It could be a tricky month to navigate for the relegated former Premier League side, what with Olsson’s confirmed absence. Of course January does bring a certain degree of respite what with the re-opening of the transfer window.
It might also be that gentle nudge of encouragement that the Swans need to bring in some bodies in order to mount a more determined charge throughout the 2019 part of the Sky Bet Championship campaign.