Swansea City announced yesterday that a deal was agreed two weeks ago to terminate Cooper's contract by mutual consent. It doesn't appear clear as to why the club have waited these two weeks as there doesn't seem to be any replacement immediately lined-up to come in for Cooper, however, the club may have been hoping the likes of Crystal Palace, Fulham or West Brom would have paid the £4.5million compensation deal written into Cooper's Swansea Contract.
Although Steve Cooper leaving this late on in pre-season is sure to leave a sour taste for many of the Jack army, it hasn't been a sense of doom and gloom amongst the supporters on social-media, with many fans expressing their admiration for Cooper but believing it is the right time for him to be leaving the club.
Although Swansea's results have been impressive since Cooper began his management journey with the Swans, the style of play has often been sacrificed.
The club must now find a replacement who can make those steps to re-introduce the Swansea's traditional high-possession style of play.
One such man who may fit the bill and who has been linked with the vacancy in South Wales is former Chelsea U-18 manager Jody Morris. Carlton Cole spoke on talkSPORT last night stating that he thinks Jody Morris will be in for a shout to takeover at Swansea. He then went on to say how Jody Morris has been looking at the job recently without Frank Lampard. Since leaving his role as Chelsea U-18s manager, Morris has enjoyed a lot of success working as Lampard's number two at Derby before moving to Chelsea.
Jody Morris enjoyed a successful playing career having represented Chelsea, Leeds, Rotherham, Millwall, St. Johnstone and Bristol City before retiring in 2013. Jody Morris will have made a number of strong relationships with those clubs and especially with the Chelsea youth academy and he may be able to pull some strings as Cooper often did to bring in some of Chelsea's promising young talents. Players like Jonathan Panzo at Dijon, Dujon Sterling and George McEachran who are both still at Chelsea are all players who Jody Morris has previously worked with and who could potentially improve the Swansea squad if they were to follow Morris to South Wales.
Another man who has been linked to the Swansea job is QPR Assistant Manager John Eustace.
John Eustace enjoyed a successful footballing career. The former central-midfielder represented Stoke, Watford and Derby as well as a host of other teams throughout the EFL. Since his retirement from playing in 2015, the Englishman led Kidderminster Harriers to 2nd in the National League North in his first season as a manager before leading the team to 4th the following year. Eustace then joined Steve McClaren at QPR and stayed at the club after McClaren's sacking to support current QPR manager Mark Warburton as his assistant-manager.
Eustace has a clear albeit brief track record of achieving good results with minimal resources. This would make Eustace a preferred option for Swansea City as the hierarchy at the club look more determined than ever to not invest into the playing staff at the club. Eustace doesn't have many connections in terms of players to call on that he could bring with him to Swansea and he is unlikely to bring any of QPR's first-team with him.
Meanwhile, the bookies have Eddie Howe, Frank Lampard and John Terry as the favourites for the Swansea job although the Jack Army fanbase will be well aware that there is no chance that the board would be willing to pay the wages for these high-earners.
It will be interesting to see who Swansea go for but the most important thing is that an appointment is made sooner rather than later as the season edges closer and closer.