Former Swansea City midfielder Owain Tudur Jones has expressed his concerns about the current state of play at the Liberty Stadium in a BBC interview, predicting his former club to be in a relegation battle next season.
The Swans suffered a major blow yesterday when their top target John Eustace was forced to 'reluctantly' turn down the offer of succeeding Steve Cooper at the Championship side - and are now set to lose captain Tom Grimes to second-tier rivals Fulham with just under a fortnight to go until the new season gets underway.
According to the Daily Mail, the 26-year-old is due to have his medical in west London ahead of a permanent move to the capital and looks set to say his goodbyes after spending the past six years in Wales.
During that time, he has witnessed Premier League football, relegation and two consecutive finishes in the play-off places in the past two seasons but will now aim for promotion at another club with Marco Silva's side one of the favourites to go straight back up.
However, Grimes will not be the only high-profile departure at the Liberty Stadium this summer. Andre Ayew also left the club on the expiry of his contract this summer and this leaves major holes for the new appointment to plug.
After seeing many key players leave the Swans in recent years and their owners failing to fully reinvest this money into their playing squad, former midfielder Owain Tudur Jones is extremely pessimistic about the upcoming season with no manager and captain in place.
Jones, who spent four years at the club between 2005 and 2009, said to the BBC: "It's a big concern.
"Anyone who's ambitious in football might be thinking that Swansea's not the right club to go to at this moment in time.
"I think there's a long season ahead of them and can't see anything apart from a relegation fight, unless they bring in more players.
"Swansea have proved over the past couple of seasons, since they got relegated from the Premier League, that they're a selling club, and the money they've got from selling players like Dan James, Joe Rodon and Oli McBurnie hasn't been reinvested into the squad.
"What we've seen over the years are people like Leon Britton and Alan Curtis, who understand the club, helping to appoint new managers. They don't have that anymore because they've left. Something big needs to change."
The Verdict:
The Swans should be reaping the rewards of making several high-profile sales by bringing in some top-quality players but instead, there just seems to be cutbacks at the Liberty Stadium.
Although the Covid-19 pandemic has had a real effect on clubs financially, they have made millions from selling the likes of James, Rodon and McBurnie as Jones pointed out.
In the next month, the owners need to make it up to the fans who have seen the club being plunged into chaos with Cooper's departure and Grimes' imminent move to a Championship competitor.
They can do this by appointing a proven manager and giving him the funds needed to overhaul the squad and prepare them for battle again. Whether they will do this remains to be seen, but fans of the Welsh side have every right to be upset right now at the state of the club.