A rawness that costs: how Alessio Da Cruz fared in Sheffield Wednesday's defeat at Swansea City

All the signs were that Sheffield Wednesday had signed the mad man of Holland.
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Alessio Da Cruz was a red card magnet we were told, one who fell out with everyone around him. Garry Monk was only able to bring the Parma man to Hillsborough because his loan spell at Serie B Ascoli had been cut short due to an omnishambles of disciplinary issues. This, we all thought, was going to be interesting.

Except up to now, it hasn’t. In fact, it’s been anything but. Leading into Sheffield Wednesday’s 2-1 defeat to Swansea City, Alessio Da Cruz had spent the majority of his Hillsborough career floating around with no aggression at all, largely ineffective and bereft of any talking points.

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But this is a new Sheffield Wednesday, shaping up in a new system and with a new outlook on how to go about winning football matches. It’s an outlook centred on movement, quick feet and dynamism and while Owls boss Garry Monk admits himself it’s a work in progress, it’s one players like Da Cruz should enjoy.

Alessio Da Cruz bounds down on Swansea City forward Andre Ayew.Alessio Da Cruz bounds down on Swansea City forward Andre Ayew.
Alessio Da Cruz bounds down on Swansea City forward Andre Ayew.

Handed the chance to impress ahead of Jordan Rhodes, he did so in a first half Wednesday had the far better of.

He was busy, harrying Swansea defenders and picking up spaces between the lines that the movement of Rhodes or Atdhe Nuhiu would not have found. Once or twice his quick feet opened up half-chances to make something happen and he drew fouls.

He received the ball 25 times, he completed 82% of his passes. But in the big moments; two big, big moments in particular, he came up short.

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Because had either of his two chances in that first half found the back of the net, the game would have gone very differently. Together with Jacob Murphy, who too squandered a brace of chances, they took up what is now a long-held Owls tradition of not making their purple patches count.

And it’s a lack of clinical edge – of quality perhaps – that has cost the club several places in the Championship this season.

With Da Cruz on the field Wednesday have more energy in the front line, more of the dynamism the Garry Monk revolution is setting up for. But the word that best describes the Dutchman is ‘raw’.

He does add something. He increases the Owls threat from set pieces and his movement drags defenders out of position. But he needs to take his chances when they come.

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He’s not alone in that regard in the Wednesday changing room, far from it. The opportunity is there for one of their forwards to take what’s left of their season by the collars alongside Connor Wickham.

Speaking to The Star back in February, Da Cruz said: “You have to come with a good energy; a different energy. I try to do it in the games and I hope that everybody follows.

“With the remaining games, there is no time to lose another match, we just need to do it now; however it comes.

“It is not hoping [to win]. We just have to do it.”

Indeed they do.

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