De Vries Targets Clean-Sheet Record

Goalkeeper Dorus De Vries is looking to break a club record of the number of clean sheets maintained in a season.

Roger Freestone, a much-loved Swansea City legend holds the record of 22 clean-sheets in a season, and Dutchman De Vries already has 8 to his name this year in the Championship.

De Vries told the Evening Post that this record is not just thanks to the goalkeeper, but the excellent work by the strong defence in front of him, he said:

“I was reminded about Roger’s record last week and you’ve always got personal and team targets,”

“Roger was a legend at this club, a great goalkeeper for many years at Swansea.

“The supporters still talk about him, but those were different times and over the last couple of years at Swansea we’ve liked to play attractive football.

“So at times you’re a little bit exposed. But it will be a great team effort if we can beat that record.

“It might be the goalkeeper’s name (on the record) but it’s not really like that.

“It’s down to the whole team and you can see that when Craig Beattie pulled off a great clearance on the line.

“That’s a major difference because otherwise you’re 1-0 down.”

De Vries also talked about how the team is defending differently under new boss Paulo Sousa and how the zonal marking system is working for them.

“In Holland when I was playing in the Eredivisie, three or four teams were doing it and they were pretty good at it,”

“It’s all about being aggressive in those zonal positions – taking responsibility for your two or three metres of zone – and you can see our players growing in those positions.

“With the aggression has come the confidence to defend your zone and it has worked for us.

“Marking zonally has been the main thing – the gaffer has stood tall to bring it in – but there are lots of differences to the way we defended under Roberto.

“Paulo has got a real eye for small details and he is building on from what Roberto left here.”

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