Hello everybody,
I am happy to report that I hope everything is back to normal now following my concussion, which I suffered at Cardiff City.
I managed to play on Wednesday at Chelsea and that means I'm back to normal. It was a sad and hard moment for my family when it happened, but now I am back on track and I am happy to be here!
I need to keep working hard on my shape because football is a really strange sport. When you are out for a week, you lose your fitness, so I've been working hard with the fitness coach and the training staff and will continue to do so.
On Wednesday I managed to play 90 minutes. It wasn't an easy game but my team-mates helped me. When you play against a team like Chelsea, you know they are going to have the ball so you have to be strong defensively. I'm pretty happy with my return to the team.
You have to expect that sort of performance from one of the big teams in the league, as you do from Manchester City, Manchester United or Arsenal. They keep moving in the midfield and don't stay in one position, so you really have to stay concentrated and strong as a team.
On Wednesday we got the clean sheet, but that was not just the back four, but the whole team. You need your striker and midfield to be good and, to be fair, our goalkeeper Adrian was superb. He made some important saves and helped us to get the point.
We play at home to Swansea on Saturday and it will be really nice to get our home form back, because especially now we need points. We need to be clinical when we play at home to get the points on the board.
Against Swansea, it's going to be a hard game, but after Wednesday we have more confidence. We have to keep working hard because in the Premier League every game is different. You cannot expect, because you drew against Chelsea, that you will necessarily win against Swansea. That said, it's in our hands, so we need to do the job.
Swansea have one player who I know well in their striker Wilfried Bony, who I have trained alongside with our national team Ivory Coast.
Wilfried is a really good striker and that's why he has made it to the national team. What can I say about him? He's a tank! When you see his body, he is a tank, while he is also technical, has a good finish and is smart, so we have to stop him.
We need to defend well as a team, and we have the ability to do that. James Tomkins and James Collins played very well on Wednesday, while Winston Reid could be back. No matter who plays, we have to get back to our defensive shape and make sure Wilfried isn't going to shine on Saturday!
Have a good weekend!
Guy