Phil SumblerSwansea City are going to the Championship play off final after a 1-1 draw at the Liberty was enough to see off Barnsley 2-1 on aggregate thanks to a special Matt Grimes goal and another strong defensive performance.
It would be fair to say that neither of the two legs of this tie matched any of the tension that we felt ten years ago when reaching the play off final but ultimately the result was the same and the Swans will now face Brentford next Saturday for the right to take the 20th and last Premier League spot for next season.
It was a doubly special night for the Swans as they welcomed back their fans to the stadium after a 63 week absence and the Jack Army was in good voice as they backed the team all the way and celebrated at the end as you would expect knowing that by this time next week we could be celebrating a third top flight promotion.
The only downside of the night would be what would be a terrible end of Wayne Routledge’s career as he left the field on a stretcher in the second half with what looked a particularly nasty injury.
It was captain Matt Grimes who scored the all important goal for the Swans with a superb finish just before the half time break, it was a goal worthy of securing any Wembley place and a great reminder of the elation you can feel when your team scores an important goal – something that has been missing for all of us for too long.
Ironically it was a slip from Grimes in the second half that helped set up the Barnsley goal which was on the break away from a long Connor Roberts throw but it ended up just adding to the tension as Barnsley tried to chip away at a defence that has gradually got the better of them in all four meetings this season between the two sides.
Nothing was going to get in the way of what probably appeared to be destiny for some time and that is the Swans and Brentford going head to head at Wembley next week.ย ย Brentford will believe that they have the better of us but this is a one off game and anything can happen.
Over the course of two legs Steve Cooper and his side should take all the credit they deserve.ย It may not be free flowing football but we are habitually effective at games like this and ultimately we got to the next stage of the competition which was always going to be what we needed to do.
The celebrations of Freddie Woodman and Andre Ayew at the moment said it all about how much this means to our players and we need just one performance from them all and that Premier League place could be ours.
As the big screens said at the Liberty this evening, we all believe.
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MATCH FACTS AND LINE UPS
OTHER CHAMPIONSHIP RESULTS
NEXT UP FOR THE SWANS
