Swansea AFC 2013/14 Home - Michu 9 (Small)

Twenty-two years after Swansea’s previous European appearance, the club finally returned to continental football in August 2013. Their first game back was at the Liberty Stadium against Malmö and it was Michu who scored the first goal, finishing in the 37th minute before Swansea ran out 4–0 winners. It was also the beginning of Swansea’s first-ever Europa League campaign. 

It was almost ridiculous how naturally Michu carried on from the season before. The £2 million signing from Rayo Vallecano had scored 22 goals in his debut campaign and swept four prizes at Swansea’s end-of-season awards; now, wearing No.9 again, he scored against Malmö, Petrolul Ploiești, Valencia at the Mestalla and Kuban Krasnodar to reach four European goals during the run. 

There is another very 2013 detail on this shirt: Goldenway/GWFX. Previous sponsor 32Red agreed to end its deal one year early, and Swansea replaced it with Goldenway in what the club described at the time as the largest sponsorship agreement in its 101-year history, with a major focus on expanding the club’s profile in Greater China. 

And this shirt ended up marking the closing chapter of the Michu phenomenon. An ankle injury wrecked much of his second season, his April 2014 appearance against Hull proved to be his last for Swansea, and he left for Napoli on loan that summer without ever playing for the Swans again. What began with Swansea returning to Europe after two decades therefore became, unexpectedly, the final season in which one of the Premier League’s greatest cult signings actually wore the club’s shirt.