SWANSEA MANAGER Michael Laudrup has revealed he is still keen to trim down the squad he inherited from Brendan Rodgers.
Premier League rules state that clubs are allowed to register a 25-man squad, however the 48-year-old has stated that a squad of that size is too big and he would want to choose from no more than 23 players.
“The idea is to work with 22 or maximum 23 players, and there are a lot of reasons for that,” he told the South Wales Evening Post. ”First of all, you will then have a squad where everybody feels they are close to the 18-man squad for each game.
“If you have 25 players, you have to leave out seven every time and that’s too many. If you are always one of the seven, after three months you will say, ‘What am I doing here?’
“That’s one part of it; another part is to do with the youngsters. If they see 25 players in the first squad they think it is very difficult to break into it.
“But if it is smaller and you have three or four injuries, one or two of the young players can come into the first-team squad and they will be happy that it’s not impossible to get there.”
Despite knowing how many players he would like to start the season off with, Laudrup is still unsure at who will be leaving the club before the transfer window shuts.
“Everyone starts out the same in pre-season,” he said. ”The market is open until 31 August and a lot of things can happen in that time — a lot of things can happen in the last week of the window.
“The fair thing to do is to look at everyone in training and in some games. Eventually we will reach a moment where we have to make some decisions. But the idea for me is to work with 22 or 23 players.”
