OPINION: £3.2m for a World Cup captain: why Eustáquio can make Swansea real promotion contenders

I’ll admit it: the signing of Stephen Eustáquio from Porto caught me off guard.

Everyone knew Swansea needed a midfielder. Ethan Galbraith had gone to Stoke in an eight-figure deal, and Gonçalo Franco’s ankle injury had left Vitor Matos short in the middle of the park.

What nobody expected was a 29-year-old who had just worn Canada’s armband through most of a home World Cup, and scored the stoppage-time winner against South Africa that took them further than ever before.

A statement of intent for £3.2m

For a reported £3.2m, Swansea landed a player with four and a half years and more than 150 appearances at Porto, Champions League football and 61 caps.

That’s not the signing of a club trying to stay comfortable in the Championship. It’s the signing of a club that thinks it can go up.

Last season the Swans finished 11th. As late as August, pundit Aaron McLean had them down as a “middle-of-the-road team”.

The phone call that did it

The deal came down to one call. Matos began his coaching career at Porto, then spent five years at Liverpool as elite development coach under Jürgen Klopp. That pedigree opens doors most Championship managers can’t.

Eustáquio made no secret of it. “A big part of my decision to come here was obviously the coach. I know what type of work he does,” he said after signing.

He went further. “It was almost like a no-brainer for me.”

Matos was just as clear about why he wanted him. “He offers a lot in terms of playmaking,” the head coach said. “That allows us to have more progression in different ways to the last third.”

What six games have shown

He made his debut in the 3-0 win at Derby, two days after signing.

What stands out is how he plays. He drops in to collect from the centre-backs, screens the back four so others can push on, and looks for the pass that goes through a team rather than around it.

The numbers back that up. In 394 minutes across six games, four of them starts, he has completed 225 passes at 86.9%, created seven chances and has a goal and an assist, according to FotMob.

He does the dirty work too. “If I had to make a decision, it’s to be a warrior on the pitch,” he said when he arrived, and he has been.

At Lincoln, a goal down at half-time with top spot on the line, it was Eustáquio who won it. Filip Lissah squared, and his 20-yard drive took a deflection off Ryley Towler on its way in.

Tiki-taka, with teeth

The slow, patient tiki-taka of old isn’t coming back in its exact form. What Matos has built is quicker and harder.

The Swans still want the ball, but they move it forward faster, press high and try to win it back the moment they lose it. Eustáquio is the player who makes both halves of that work.

Top of the table, with the fewest goals conceded in the division, suggests it’s working.

The real test starts with Norwich

Six games is not a season, and I don’t want to get carried away. The one defeat came at Southampton, where Eustáquio started on the bench.

Don Goodman has said the run of Norwich, Millwall, West Ham and QPR will show whether the Swans are “the real deal”.

That’s where I’ll be watching Eustáquio. If he can set the tempo in those games, with Franco fit again and Marko Stamenic and Elijah Just alongside him, Swansea won’t be a surprise package any more.

They’ll be genuine promotion contenders, and £3.2m will look like a bargain.