Last season Swansea were extremely reliant on their Ghanaian talisman.
Of Swansea’s 42 goals last season Ayew was involved in 14 of them, which equates to a third of all Swansea’s conversions. His incredible work rate, decision making, and deceptive aerial presence made Ayew stand out in what was a poor Swansea team last term. Which begs the question, how will they replace his presence.
Bafetimbi Gomis struck up an extremely effective partnership with Ayew last year, but at 31 he is not the player he was, and for some crazy reason has been allowed to leave on loan. This accompanied by the sale of Alberto Paloschi leaves Swansea perilously short on attacking players, with Euro 2016 winner Eder also leaving for Lille.
As such, new signing Fernando Llorente is the only real striker on the books aside from squad player Marvin Emnes, who few would argue is good enough to save Swansea from the drop. Llorente is undoubtedly a good buy, having scored goals wherever he’s been and playing european football for the majority of his career. But relying on ageing target men is often a feature of many relegated teams (Just see fulham with Berbatov in 2014) and Swansea will need something more.
Llorente is a good replacement for Gomis, if not something of an improvement, but on Ayew there is not yet anyone to fill the void.
This is why the signing of Borja, a target who plied his trade in La Liga last season is key for the Swans to maintain their Premier League survival. All the promoted sides such as Middlesborough and Hull seem stronger than your average promoted side, and the rest of the league has invested heavily across the board. So Swansea need to follow suit.
If the Borja transfer goes through and a partnership between Llorente and the Atleti striker flourishes, the Swans will be fine.
With an emerging Modou Barrow also doing well, it may not all be doom and gloom after Ayew Sale after all.
But that Borja signing is key.
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