Soccer
Swansea set to seal Jeremy Monga loan deal after reaching Championship summit
Swansea were set to complete the expected loan signing of Manchester City’s Jeremy Monga after beating Watford to go top of the Sky Bet Championship.
Adam Idah and Eom Ji-sung struck in the opening half-hour as Swansea won 2-0 to take over at the summit from Charlton, who visit West Brom on Wednesday.
The Swans were due to add Monga on a season-long loan deal after City had signed the 17-year-old winger from Leicester earlier in the summer window.
Swans fans feared the deadline-day move might have been thrown in to doubt after wingers Ronald and Zeidane Inoussa saw respective departures to Millwall and Portsmouth collapse, but the paperwork on the Monga deal was completed in time.
Zan Vipotnik, last season’s Championship top scorer, remains at Swansea for now after being linked with a move away this summer.
Vipotnik came off the bench against Watford, but Swansea boss Vitor Matos admitted the Slovenia striker could still leave with markets open in Portugal, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
Matos said: “At the moment, yes, he is with us. But some markets are still open, so we never know what happens.
“He’s here and I’m really happy if he stays. We all love him. It’s not easy in dealing with all the noise, of course.
“We hope he is here, but that is the hard part of the transfer window is that some markets are still open that are massive opportunities for players.”
Matos downplayed Swansea taking top spot in the Championship for the first time since October 2019.
“It doesn’t mean nothing at the moment,” Matos said.
“There was a lot of style that we want. I’m really happy, but there a lot (of the season) to come.
“It’s really nice to play the way we did and score those goals because it’s good in terms of our identity and we are going in that direction.
“We just need to rest, recover and start thinking about Wrexham.”
Watford boss Alessio Dionisi expressed his disappointment after the Hornets lost their unbeaten league record.
Dionisi said: “I’m not happy for this match. We played bad and Swansea in possession played well.
“The first half score was right. The second half was different, but we did not work well out of possession without the ball. I didn’t see what I wanted.”
Deadline day signing Branimir Mlacic, 19, made his debut after replacing the injured Omar Haktab Traore in the first half.
And Watford were reinforced in the closing minutes of the transfer window with the additions of Strasbourg defender Soumaila Coulibaly and Leicester forward Stephy Mavididi.
Dionisi said: “I will know new players tomorrow and it’s important for us, but now I just speak about the match.”
