John Swift gave his agency instructions to complete the trade after learning of West Brom’s interest.
West Brom’s top scorer and playmaker John Swift was the subject of interest in the summer transfer window, but he had no intention of leaving
Playmaker Swift, who is set to miss the next six weeks with a calf strain, was linked with a move to Coventry City towards the end of August, but Albion warded off interested parties in Swift and in their other assets – despite the increasingly desperate need to balance the books – in order to grant Carlos Corberan as strong a squad as possible with which to attack the Championship.
Since, Swift has proven why Albion were correct to reject the prospect of Swift departing The Hawthorns after just a single season; he is their outright top scorer having returned six goals in the first 11 games of the season, and is already just a goal behind his entire goal haul of last year, with only one of those goals coming from the penalty spot.
It turns out that Swift himself is settled in his surroundings, enjoys spending time with his teammates and the coaching staff at the club’s Walsall training ground, so much so that when that late interest and the possibility of a move presented itself late in the summer, he picked the phone up to his representative and informed him that he had no intention of leaving.
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“To be honest it was so late in the window, I had no idea of it and when it did come about I knew it was two days left and nothing was going to get done – and even if it did I didn’t really want to leave,” Swift said.
“As soon as I found out I rung my agent and told him I didn’t really want to go, I wasn’t interested in leaving. I wanted to stay and had my head on staying whenever we finished the game against Swansea last season. That’s how it is in football, some things come right at the end [of the window], but for me it was a no-brainer to stay.”
Swift recognises the challenges in the form of strong opponents around them in the second tier, and the struggles Albion had to contend with in the transfer window as they laboured to strengthen their own squad amid their own financial limitations, but he doesn’t see the collective aim of the club and all within it changing.
“It’s West Brom, we should be in the top six at least, but the teams in this league, Preston were up there, who would’ve expected that? The league now is so competitive, it’s every team, every game is almost a must-win because if a team five points off you gets two wins and you don’t you can drop five positions,” he added.
“We’ve not started well but we’ve not started badly. If we get two or three wins we can shoot up. Everyone’s confident in our abilities. With Grady being back, lads coming off the bench doing well, it gives everyone a boost.”
