The international break has seen Joe Allen win his first starts for Wales - and play well - and Michel Vorm take over from an injured Maarten Stekelenburg in the Dutch goal. Allen's Wales debut allowed the Swans to feature three players among the national side's starters for the first time since the early Eighties, and demonstrates the Swans contribution to what Brendan Rodgers has described as the start of a Golden Era for Welsh sport.

Meanwhile Greek international defender Vangelis Moras has joined the team as cover until January, and will feature in this afternoon's game versus Norwich, possibly starting on the bench.

The game against Norwich is one of the biggest of the season for Swansea; these are the tooth-and-nail, scrap for survival battles which will define the balance of power between the newly promoted teams. A win at Carrow Road would be a significant boon. Towards the end of any season, when the most interest is to be found at the bottom of the table, it is results in matches like these which pundits and fans alike pore over and analyse; nobody ever looks back to a 4-1 thumping on the road against a big six side as the result which condemned a small team to the drop, after all.

Despite the season's relative infancy, there is a strong chance that Swansea will play well enough to avoid being dragged into a relegation dog fight at all come the end. The Swans have played exceptionally well so far, only suffering defeat to the Premier League giants whilst trumping solid teams like WBA and Stoke, and keeping clean sheets in the process.

In last seasons Championship fixtures between Norwich and Swansea, the home side prevailed, with Norwich earning a two nil decision at Carrow Road via two late goals and Swansea memorably beating the Canaries three nil at the Liberty in the home stretch. Both teams have changed since then, and one significant difference might be the Swans signing of Danny Graham. Graham netted twice at Carrow Road for Watford last season, and will hopefully rekindle those memories in a Swans shirt this time around.

The Swans have yet to pick up any points on the road by virtue of a tough early schedule, but now have an excellent chance to do just that. Norwich have yet to keep any clean sheets, which is a trend Danny Graham and the rest of the Swans will look to prolong.

As promised at the end of my last post, here is my latest "performance index". The usual caveats apply; the "cold" players are not lousy players, they are just the players who have made the least statistical impact so far...

Angel Rangel continues to lead the line as Swansea's most statistically influential player, whilst Joe Allen has stepped up in Leon Britton's absence. Nathan Dyer narrowly misses a top five place, but will likely play a big role in today's game, in which both teams wide men will have a large say in the outcome.

Predictions?