How is Luke Jephcott fitting in at Swindon Town?

Luke Jephcott’s deadline day arrival on loan from Plymouth Argyle was Sandro Di Michele’s highest profile addition of his first transfer window as Technical Director, so why did they decide to get him? Total Sport’s Joe Acklam looks at the impact of Swindon’s new main striker.

Scott Lindsey’s Swindon Town want to play high and wide and attempt to stretch their opposition’s defence, and they do this by rotating between their wingers, full-backs, and outside central midfielders to move defenders out of position and henceforth create space.

Lindsey is happy for his wingers to roam into central spaces or even switch sides so that they can cause communication problems for defenders, but as they create space out wide he wants his striker to remain in the middle so that someone is in the box to aim at.

Jacob Wakeling has been the main striker so far this season and has dutifully tried to stay in the middle, but he is happier trying to run in behind and use his busy style to impact games across the pitch.

As you can see this in his heatmap for the season from Sofascore, Jephcott has very little interest in going into wide areas and wants to remain where he is mostly likely to score.

In build-up, Jephcott will look to remain within the width of the penalty box as much as possible and stay on the last line of defence.

Jephcott looks to occupy the defenders, making himself an option to receive a pass as much as possible and force the centre backs to follow him from side to side to stop the ball going into him.

But he will also periodically perform a choreographed movement akin to Ricky Bobby’s slingshot where he drops deeper and either creates space in behind for someone else to run into or find himself with lots of room to receive an easy forward pass.

The main idea behind the 22-year-old being in the team is his instincts in the box and his first goal is a perfect example of this as he was just in position to gobble up the rebound from Ronan Darcy’s shot.

His shooting statistics from WhoScored? demonstrate what he is about as so far he has been averaging 1.8 shots per 90, of which 1.3 are inside the penalty area, 0.5 have come from inside the six-yard box, and none outside the box.

His goal against Grimsby may have been his first but he is almost always in that position, he has had very presentable chances against Sutton and Gillingham from similar scenarios.

Jonny Williams’ goal against Sutton comes by virtue of Jephcott close to goal and latching onto uncertainty in the defenders and teeing up the Welsh international.

His defensive movements are very similar to his attacking ones, he will continue to remain within the width of the box and only presses the centre backs.

Swindon press in a man-to-man style and so midfielders are expected to track midfielders even if they drop deeper towards Jephcott, he will leave that player and instead look to stop them being able to move the ball across the back line.

Ultimately Jephcott has been getting up to speed on the fly at the County Ground having been barely used by Plymouth to start the season, but he is showing all the signs of why Swindon wanted him and he is becoming more comfortable every game.