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Wales Online
Wales Online
Sport
Mathew Davies

The familiar face spotted in the Swansea City stands against Atalanta and why he could have been there

There were around 7,000 people watching Swansea City take on Atalanta at the Liberty Stadium on Saturday.

Those who were there were treated to a decent second-half performance from the home side, who took the game to the Serie A outfit after a rather pedestrian opening 45 minutes.

And there was a familiar face spotted in the stands, who was taking notes during the game.

Kyle Macaulay, Swansea's former head of recruitment, was sat alone in the family stand, with a note pad and pen, watching on as the match played out on a slick, sun-kissed pitch.

Macaulay followed former Swansea manager Graham Potter to Brighton earlier this summer to take up a similar role at the Premier League club.

He is one of Potter's right-hand men on the recruitment front, and he was recently spotted with the manager at Fratton Park taking in the League One play-off semi-final between Portsmouth and Sunderland, just before the pair left for the Amex Stadium.

That night they were most likely scouting Pompey's Matthew Clarke, who subsequently signed for the Seagulls for an undisclosed fee. Clarke was a reported target for Swansea in the previous transfer window in January.

So why was Macaulay at the game yesterday?

We can only speculate, but Potter and Brighton have been linked with Oli McBurnie and Matt Grimes earlier this summer. It strikes as a bit strange that he would have to watch them again though - surely both he and Potter know all about their respective strengths and weaknesses?

Perhaps he was looking at an Atalanta player? Timothy Castagne lined up for the visitors in SA1, and the right-back was continually linked with Swansea and Celtic back in January.

A fee of £6million was touted then, which put Swansea out of the equation, but that would be small fry for a Premier League side like Brighton.

Swansea will hope that Macaulay was there to scout the opposition, rather than his old side. 

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