If anyone’s wants proof that shopping for players on low salaries in the Championship doesn’t pay off then it was evidenced today. Despite a very competent back four and keeper the rest of the team was sour and lacked any punch or awareness in controlling a football. Persistently caught offside or tripping over the ball, giving it away or relying on Myles Peart-Harris and a tired Ronald just wasn’t going to work.
Despite that the game could have been won, and should have been a draw, until that is referee David Webb stepped in and awarded a penalty for a dubious handball two minutes into four being played of injury time. I genuinely thought he was having a good game. That was until a linesman through rain thirty yards away adjudged Matt Grimes to put his hand to ball for the decisive decision. There is a plethora of incompetency in the officiating of Championship games, but for a referee to go with a decision from a guy far from the action through poor weather is pretty alarming.
The Swans starting by dominating the play which fashioned little bar a Myles Peart-Harris opportunity to shoot, he didn’t, he did too much. And that movement set the tone for the Swans throughout this game. The domination continued into the ninth minute before Burnley had an opening with their own Cullen, Josh linking with Josh Brownhill who shot high and wide. Both sides looked relatively comfortable, but the Swans were finding retention of the ball difficult on ten minutes. The lack of strength on the ball and ability to be more confident leading to more dominance from the home side.
The Swans lack of awareness giving their hosts a lot of confidence.
The home crowd were desperately quiet, However, that changed a little when Burnley earned a corner from a Ben Cabango defensive header. That led to more pressure as Burnley really started to put their own stamp on this fixture. When Ronald broke free from a Burnley attack he was surrounded by three Clarets players. They had clealry identified him as a dangerman. Then a real opportunity for the Swans on sixteen minutes, Ronald was put away by Tymon. His cross fell to Joe Allen who instead of blasting the ball through his laces opened his body up too much and didn’t bother the Burnley keeper.
On eighteen minutes a lovely corner from Piris reached Flemming who really should have scored close in from a powerful header, more placement, less power required. Loose passing from the Swans continued as everything they gave away was leading to danger in their own area. Then on twenty minutes Anthony was brought down by Tymon right on the edge of the penalty area. Another chance given to the home side through an inability to at least hold on to the ball. It was well defended by the Swans wall and that led to a rasping shot from Cullen which Vigouroux dealt with well. The misplaced passing from the Swans continued. More domination from the Clarests as a result.
Burnley were squeezing the midfield well and pressurising the Swans into errors. Josh Key again giving the ball away when in possession. It was very untidy from the away side. When the Swans did get forwards a Peart-Harris cross was miss hit and that ended the move. From there Josh Cullen again took a pot shot at Vigouroux’s goal, again he handled it easily.
We had passed the half way mark of the first half, and really the Swans were not impressive. Ronald had been caught offside too often allowing Burnley to build again. Peart-Harris then became another offender - giving the ball away on twenty eight minutes when he really should have crossed with players waiting in the penalty area. He needed to switch on to his surroundings for sure. Now we were seeing a bit more dominance of the ball from the Swans, but it was merely in their own area and on the fringes of the half way line. Ronald then gave the ball away on thirty minutes trying to do too much, and we could only hope the Swans could get to half time unpunished. Josh Cullen got himself a yellow card bringing down Ronald ruthlessly when he was away from his marker.
Another offside, this time Peart-Harris who really wasn’t on his game, yards off. On this form he wasn’t going to last the ninety minutes. An observation from me was the lack of participation from Zǎn Vipotnik, he needs service, but he looked fairly listless at this point. On thirty four minutes we again saw another offside given against Ronald. Really, he has to look across the line before making runs, he has the pace, there’s no need to commit so early.
Then a misunderstanding in defence involving Vipotnik saw a lovely opportunity for Burnley when Brownhill was just short of a dangerous cross, Tymon cleared the danger. We have seen that a a lot of times this season from Tymon. He read the situation well. A minute later Vipotnik was given a perfect pass from Franco into the Burnley area. He took it well, showed strength but fired his shot into the side netting. Those are the chances teams at the top take, but not the Swans today. The game was hotting up as Jayden Anthony seized on a ball from outside the area and his shot was very close to going in. From there Peart-Harris was put through by Joe Allen, but his cross was poor. Immediately from that move Tymon delivered a threatening cross from the Swans left, Vipotnik was the only player to try and turn the ball home, he was inches away from contact.
There most certainly wasn’t a lot between the sides, the only issue for the away side was their poor passing at times and lack of endeavour out on the wings. Both sides could have easily scored two a piece as we entered the final minute of the half. Vigouroux saved his side on forty five minutes with a fine save from Koliosho. The Swans earned a free kick in added time. Josh Cullen the offender and he was told very clearly any more of that and he would be sent off, already on a yellow card. The sad thing there would be more from Josh Cullen, he could have easily earned a second yellow on three occasions. Grimes delivered from the Swans right, it was messed up and somehow the game reached half time without a goal.
The Swans started the second half with another offside, again Peart-Harris. Burnley had come out far more aggressive. Grimes messed up a free kick, but the Swans were looking a bit fragile at the back with the ball going backwards far too often. Key did provide a cross on forty nine minutes but the Swans couldn’t make much of it. The aggression continued from Burnley as a Tymon well won tackle ended up with more poor ball retention. Referee David Webb seemed to have a handle on the game going into fifty two minutes. Harry Darling turned to the ‘Tatey’ handbook on fifty three, it was needed as he was under pressure out on the Swans left.
However, Burnley were now the better side.
The Swans were definitely in defensive posture and any long ball was poorly executed. The same could be said for Burnley, their final pass lacking. They were though carving out chances and on fifty seven minutes the ball was blasted over by Sarimiento. The Swans lack of composure was emphasised as we approached the last half an hour with Franco adding to the poor touches list. I could see Liam Cullen and Florian Bianchini readying themselves to come on, clealry Luke Williams the Swans head coach had seen enough. Liam came on for Joe Allen, and Bipotnik was replaced by Cullen. Peart-Harris had escaped the hook for now.
Burnley pressed with a Swans player down injured bit again Flemming headed wide. Then Sarimiento blasted wide as well. This game was only going one way, the Swans looked out of ideas. Another attack from poor decision making was disrupted by Cabango and the Swans broke. Peart-Harris slowed the ball down but his pass to Key saw a lovely cross headed at the back post by Ronald but again the Swans were offside. That seemed to inspire the Swans with some dangerous movement around the Burnley penalty area. A pass from Peart-Harris to Key saw his shot saved fairly easily. We were now approaching seventy minutes with Burnley throwing a few dices to get the win. One of them Bashir Humphreys.
Franco wasn’t helping matters giving the ball away in midfield.
We entered the last twenty with a feeling one goal would win this. The very decent Swans support continued to dominate the vocal war, could that be enough ? Vigouroux started a move on seventy three minutes. The passing move ended up with Ronald after a decent ball from Liam Cullen, but Tymon miss hit his shot. Burnley earned their fourth corner of the contest on seventy five minutes on the Swans right. Vigiuroux was impeded and the referee rightly gave a free kick. Unbelievably even when Bianchini was presented with a golden opportunity he weakly struck his shot and looked panicked when doing so. The class to go one better just wasn’t there. More subs from Burnley. The Swans were at no point looking dangerous in front of goal, and that really needs a remedy in January.
Peart-Harris finally met the bench on seventy eight minutes, Luke Williams signalling his intentions by bringing on defender Kyle Naughton. The Swans again frustrating their travelling support on eighty minutes with Bianchini losing control on the break. Very poor. He was having a stinker. The Swans just couldn’t make good their continual mistakes. Bashir Humphreys was next with a shot which was blocked, the home side sensed something. Then another Burnley corner. It was flicked on and going into the Swans net, but Vigouroux pulled off a world class save to deny Burnley.
Then defender Cyrus Christie came on for the Swans replacing Ronald. Now Luke Williams intentions were very clear. The Swans overall lack of awareness was even more compounded when Josh Key measured a pass which Liam Cullen stretched a leg out for when behind him Bianchini could have been in on goal. On eighty eight minutes Grimes completely messed up a free kick, instead of a cross into the box he played it short, and yes, it ended up in a Burnley attack. The whole Swansea performance was summed up with poor control from Bianchini when players were advancing forwards.
Bianchini had spent most of his time on the pitch just running around.
Then the story of the season, a penalty. Wouldn’t you just know it. We had a minute of added time to play. Grimes was furious, but it looked like a handball. Rodrigues steadied himself, and as we all knew, the game was lost. 1-0 to Burnley. The Swans performance today wasn’t good, their lack of ball control was amateurish. Peart-Harris, Bianchini and Ronald all contributing factors. Franco also had a poor game, and the final result was on the cards all half. The Swans had nobody but themselves to blame. Despite a late Swans attack (oh why couldn’t they play like this before) it fizzled out with the away sides first corner of the game. It was a poor display from players who looked half cooked and pretty clueless, especially in the second half.
The lessons of earlier on in the season had not been learned. The ability to play so poorly was back. And Swansea City had nobody but themselves to blame.
⚽️ Burnley: James Trafford, Maxime Esteve, CJ Egan-Riley, Jeremy Sarmiento (Hannibal 77), Josh Brownhill (captain), Jaidon Anthony, Connor Roberts, Zian Flemming (Jay Rodriguez 77), Lucas Pires (Bashir Humphreys 67) , Josh Cullen (Josh Laurent 77), Luca Koleosho (Enock Agyei 67).
Unchanged Substitutes: Vaclav Hladky, John Egan, Andreas Hountondji, Owen Dodgson.
⚽️ Swansea City: Lawrence Vigouroux 8 Josh Key 7:Ben Cabango 7 Harry Darling 6 Josh Tymon 6 Matt Grimes (captain) 5:Gonçalo Franco 5 Joe Allen 6 (Liam Cullen 62) 5 Ronald 5 (Cyrus Christie 85) 5 Myles Peart-Harris 4 (Kyle Naughton 77) 5 Žan Vipotnik 6 (Florian Bianchni 62) 4
Substitutes: Jon McLaughlin, Kristian Pedersen, Nathan Tjoe-A-On, Nelson Abbey, Azeem Abdulai.
Referee: David Webb : Subtly influenced the game right at the end, but the linesman needs to be looked at. 4/10.
Attendance: 18,717
Approx 325 away.
Luke Williams post match interview.