Garry Monk is up for the challenge of surviving the biggest test of his fledgling managerial career by turning around Swansea City's declining Premier League fortunes.

The 36-year-old admits he has a major job on his hands over the international break after the Swans' 1-0 defeat against Norwich City made it one league win in their last eight.

Monk was feted for guiding the Welsh club to eighth in the table last season with a record points tally, but Alex Neil's one-time team-mate is now experiencing the downside of the management game in his first posting.

'Of course I am concerned. This isn't a great moment for me, but I am a fighter – we all are here,' he said.

'That's what this club has been about throughout my time. We are here to win games and get points and in my time we have done that on a consistent basis.

'But these difficult periods are part of management. I have been here before and the only way out of this sort of run is by working even harder. It is possibly the worst run I've had but this club has been built on sticking together, on fighting and we must fight hard to show our quality.

'That's at our core and what we have to do now is work hard to get back on track. We have the quality – 100pc – but we have to do it. I have to get the group to work through it and they are more than capable of it.

'We have a break now to work on things and to make sure we are ready for Bournemouth.'

Swansea's latest setback was symptomatic of their recent spiral down the table.

'We got caught with a sucker punch against the run of play,' said Monk. 'It's been the story of the last couple of weeks, which is very frustrating for everyone. There are not many teams who will come to Carrow Road and have almost total control of the game, doing just what we wanted.

'We know these players are good enough – we have seen it already this season – it is just about getting that bit extra out of them.

'I said to them afterwards that we are the only ones who can get ourselves out of it.'

Monk's side dominated possession but failed to muster a single shot on target at Carrow Road.

'It's very frustrating,' he said. 'We were in total control up until their goal – although we weren't sharp enough in the final third. We knew they would be stubborn and work hard, and we spoke before the game about staying patient, manoeuvring the ball and waiting for our chance.

'We said that even if we had to wait until the last 10 minutes for the chance to come, that would be okay.'