Planet Swans ArchivesAn almost full strength Swans side had to grind out a hard fought victory at The Kassam tonight against an Oxford team who were reduced to ten men on the hour.
On arrival I had tickets for the Home stand but as luck should have it I bumped into an old work colleague who is a steward there. A few words and my father and I were soon escorted into the stand with the rest of the Jacks. This was surely a good omen!!
The first half was quite frustrating as we mainly hoofed the ball up front bypassing the midfield. Oxford stroked the ball around on the ground without actually going anywhere!
The best chances of the half were definitely ours without any of them being taken. One point was that ex-Premiership ref Danson has obviously failed to understand the new emphasis on cracking down on the tackle from behind!! Oxford’s defence and particularly Fatty Wanless continually went through our players without punishment. Lee Trundle as usual received more than his fair share of fouls.
At the start of the second half the game improved in quality and excitement. Both teams had chances but failed to take them. Willy produced a fantastic one handed save as he dived to his left.
We started to increase the pressure when on 60 minutes Jon Ashton was sent of for his second bookable offence. He blatantly obstructed Forbes as he made one of his many dashes down the right side.
From the ensuing free kick Trundle found space on the right and crossed, Nugent got a touch and the ball bounced at the far side. Luckily it didn’t bounce too high for the minute Goodfellow to head home!!
This started off a period of possession and domination for Swansea of about 10 mins. We nearly gave away an equaliser on 70 mins when substitute Davies played a neat one two through the middle and found himself one on one with Gueret. Luckily a defender got a touch to the ball and it ballooned over the bar. This along with Willy’s earlier save were Oxford’s only real chances.
With 15 minutes to go KJ made one of his tactical changes which I couldn’t understand. We were comfortable and one man up yet he took of Nuge and Trunds with Anderson and Connor. He had decided to defend his lead!!!
These last 15mins (plus 4 mins of injury time) were agony!!We started to defend deeply and kept turning possession over. Luckily the defence was strong and Oxford’s strikeforce were clueless!!!
Overall this was a good result at a difficult place to win. My MOM was Sam Ricketts who worked his socks off and was everywhere! Nuge , bless him, ran and ran but looked like he was going backwards! KOL and Roberto were magnificent in midfield.
This was my first experience of Goodfellow and from what I saw of him he can go back tomorrow! Yes he is left footed but he is too lightweight and failed to win any 50/50 challenges. At least when Leon plays he has some fight and tries to win those sorts of clashes. Goodfellow looked as though he would size up the challenge and if he wasn’t going to win it he wasn’t going to get involved. Perhaps I am being unfair on one performance but apart from the goal he offered little else.
On this performance we need to find our shooting boots against Scunny but I think the defence is good enough to keep their strike force out.
Well done boys I can finally take the mick at work now!!!
REPORT BY DUNCAN JOHNSON
