Swansea v West Brom

[jackaway]

Swansea v West Brom Thursday 1 Jan 15:00
It’s the new year and we move on into the second-half of the season.
There is more optimism in the camp after we secured an away win and double over lowly Oxford on Monday night which gave us a seven point gap over the bottom three and eased the pressure a bit.
We were unlucky a few days earlier not to get any points from the Coventry game which would have further widened the gap.
We are seeing a visible improvement in performances under Vitor Matos’ leadership so can we now look forward to climbing the table and dismiss any threat of relegation? One would hope so.
We lost to our next opponents the Baggies end of November at the Hawthorns in Matos’ second game in charge. This after going 0-2 up and conceding three second-half goals in a surprising capitulation through individual mistakes.
We have tightened our defence since then by moving Galbraith to right-back from midfield and resting the off-form Josh Key. This has worked well but we are missing his creative skills centrally. Hopefully a right-back replacement is on the cards in the upcoming transfer window.
West Brom are not too clever away from home so let us see if we can make it our fourth home win on the trot.

[Estoban]

Vitor has had eight games in charge now, four won four lost. Last game we got that elusive away win.
Tomorrow we play West Brom and will try and get a fourth consecutive home win.
Striker Idah looks as if he’ll be out for a while, pulling a hamstring in training, Cullen could be available again after missing the Oxford match.

[Iolo]

Happy New Year to all Swans fans.
I hope your hangovers disappear by this afternoon’s kick-off so you can enjoy the scintillating football on display from our players.
It’s freezing cold to watch a football match boys, but we Jacks don’t feel the cold to we!
Come on you Swans, please give us another win, we’re rooting for you.

[jackaway]

Happy New Year all.
Just looking at WBA’s last away match, on 20 Dec, a 1-0 defeat to 4th in the table Hull. McBurnie with a 45’ +6’ penalty and Alfie Gilchrist sent off on 75’.
Since then they have lost 1-2 at home to Bristol City and won 2-1 at home to QPR.

[Estoban]

Happy New Year everybody.
Let’s kick-start our second-half of the season with another win.
Here’s what our leader said:

https://www.swanseacity.com/news/vitor-matos-we-are-pleased-be-back-home-we-need-be-ready-perform

[jackaway]

Swansea:
Lawrence Vigouroux, Josh Key, Ben Cabango (c), Cameron Burgess, Josh Tymon, Marko Stamenic, Goncalo Franco, Malick Yalcouye, Melker Widell, Ronald, Zeidane Inoussa
Subs:
Andy Fisher, Jay Fulton, Zan Vipotnik, Jisung Eom, Ishe Samuels-Smith, Bobby Wales, Kaelan Casey, Ethan Galbraith, Sam Parker

West Brom:
Joe Wildsmith, Nathaniel Phillips, Callum Styles, George Campbell, Karlan Grant, Mikey Johnston, Ousmane Diakite, Aune Heggebo, Samuel Iling-Junior, Alex Mowatt (captain), Charlie Taylor
Subs:
Josh Griffiths, Chris Mepham, Krystian Bielik, Jayson Molumby, Josh Maja, Daryl Dike, Isaac Price, Oliver Bostock, Noah Dupont

[jackaway]

Swansea 1 (Fulton 74’) - West Brom 0
Four changes from the last match. Wales, Vipotnik, Galbraith on the bench.
Widell false 9, a 4-1-4-1 formation. Surprisingly it worked as we pressed high.
Only trouble was we kept on crossing balls into the box but no Vipotnik to challenge for them.
Fouls galore from the Baggies, 5 bookings to our 1. It was a tight game with few chances but Fulton came on and hit a beauty from 25 yards out into the top left hand corner to end the stalemate. A few scares late on as we came under pressure but we saw out the game and it was a valuable win as we leapfrogged West Brom in the table up to 15th, 8 points away from the drop.

[jackaway]

Match report

https://www.swanseacity.com/news/report-swansea-city-1-west-bromwich-albion-0-0

[jackaway]

Match highlights

https://www.skysports.com/football/video/11698/13489345/swansea-1-0-west-brom-championship-highlights

[jackaway]

Post match reaction from Vitor Matos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxxhGFiii6M

[jackaway]

Strange one in added time where Vigouroux was penalised for holding the ball too long before clearing it.
New rules, over 8 seconds and it’s a corner for the opposition.
Luckily it came to nothing. I haven’t seen this one before today.

[Iolo]

Extended highlights -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIxnXUK9514

[Iolo]

Another win boys, bag of nerves at the end. I thought West Brom looked a good side and put us to the sword at times but we won through.
Unusual line-up with Widell up front and a high press, the energy he had he was like a Duracell battery. I liked it.
It unsettled Baggies but we couldn’t keep it up for the full match and reverted to type when Vips came on.
That win eases the pressure as we move into mid-table with a tough game ahead at Millwall on Sunday.