Swansea City v Scunthorpe United
The Liberty Stadium
Coca-Cola Championship - Monday, April 5, 2010
The Iron Player subscribers can hear live commentary from 1.30pm
FULL-TIME: SWAN 3 SCUN 0: Paulo Souza blows kisses the way of the crowd as he leaves the pitch. His team played some lovely looking football today; and United were unable to contain them, and offered little attacking threat themselves. The 3-0 final score was a fair reflection on the game.
90 MIN: Hooper tries to round the last man to put himself in on-goal. He ultimately goes to ground, but isn't awarded a free-kick. That'll be that then.
89 MIN: Watford take the lead! How can today get any worse football-wise?
86 MIN: Wednesday and QPR are both trailing, but Watford are holding West Brom, and Palace remain ahead.
85 MIN: Josh Wright hits the bar with a free-kick from a tight angle. The free-kick is won after Donal McDermott is brought down.
SUB: The last change of the day is made by the home team. Shefki Kuqi gets a standing ovation, which he reaps as he walks off and is replaced by the equally as dangerous Gorka Pintado.
79 MIN: Immediately followed by chants of "we're going to win 4-3". I don't know how those fans are staying in such high spirits!
GOAL! SWAN 3 SCUN 0: Kuqi gets on the end of a back-header intended for Murphy and has all the time and space he needs (and more) to score from one-on-one. He deserves that goal, he's played really well today.
78 MIN: The chants coming from the Scunny end have now moved on to the predicatable calls of "England, England, England".
SUB: Lee Trundle comes on. That's a nice sight for Scunthorpe fans - not. As sure as night follows day, Trundle always seems to score against Scunny. Joe Allen replaced.
72 MIN: I always maintain that Scunthorpe have goals in them, but they just don't look like causing Swansea any problems today. I think they're playing in the now common 4-5-1/4-3-3 foramtion - the one with two wingers supporting the main striker, but are still offering little in the attacking department.
SUB: Pratley is brought on for the Swans. Bauza is taken off.
69 MIN: Kuqi, who appears to be a mile offside is denied fantastically by Joe Murphy before Nathan Dyer's follow-up is blocked. That was so nearly three.
SUB: The final change for Scunthorpe sees Paul Hayes withdrawn (rested?) and Martyn Woolford introduced.
65 MIN: United are yet to have a shot on-goal, and Swansea have dropped their pace a little bit - they reckon they've got this one sewn up.
SUB: Hooper on for Matt Sparrow. Thompson moves to the wing.
60 MIN: The Iron fans are still in high spirits as Gary Hooper readies himself. "Adkins, give us a wave" they chant.
58 MIN: David Cotterill sweeps a cross in for Shefki Kuqi, who tries to finish in mickey-taking fashion. He sort of backheels the ball at goal, but Joe Murphy manages to save.
57 MIN: And Palace go ahead ...
GOAL! SWAN 2 SCUN 0: Ashley Williams gets the final touch to double Swansea's lead after United took far too much time to clear a ball hanging around in the area. Once again, Scunthorpe's defending is going to come under some scrutiny. It gets worse too, Palace have drawn level.
47 MIN: McDermott battles to win a throw in an attacking area. The ball is played into the box from it, allowing Hayes to hook it across goal in the hope that someone will get on the end of it ... they don't.
SUB: United make a sub at half-time, by the way. The likeable Jim McNulty gets his debut, replacing Marcus Williams, who has carried an injury as of late that finally seems to have got the better of him.
RE-START: The Iron kick-off to commence the second period.
HALF-TIME: SWAN 1 SCUN 0: Not quite dead and buried, but United need to do something different if they are going to take anything from this one. We've seen that Swansea are really good at keeping the ball and pressing forwards, but we also know that they're not so good at actually making something come of their superiority. For that reason, I feel that Scunthorpe do still have a chance, albeit an outside one, of grabbing something today. Again, McDermott has looked promising - as has Canavan. ATT: 14,830 (away: 164)
45 MIN: Niall Canavan makes the latest in a series of sliding tackles which have succeeded in breaking up Swansea attacks whilst they're still developing.
44 MIN: Swansea win a corner after David Cotterill blasts a free-kick into the wall and it trickles out. They do nothing worthwhile with it.
42 MIN: Bauza escapes from a last-ditch Garry Thompson tackle to fire a half-volley wide. I thought that was going in, he was on the egde of the area, and couldn't have asked for a better opportunity when you're talking half-volleys.
39 MIN: Hayes and Thompson link on the edge of the Swansea area, but as Thommo returns the one-two to Hayes to put him in on-goal he appears to be shoved off course by a defender. Unbelievably, the referee doesn't blow for a foul - I bet he would've had that occured at the other end of the pitch!
34 MIN: In midfield, Matt Sparrow bullishly wins back the ball and then sends it the way of McDermott. He uses his pace to beat the defence, but as the ball runs away from him he can only poke an effort at goal. It comes back to him off a defender who is now back covering, but he's immediately crowded out and ushered away from the ball.
29 MIN: The balance of play has swung firmly back into the Welsh teams favour. They're dictating play at the moment, and almost scored a second just seconds ago when David Edgars ball forwards was brought down and hit at goal by Guillem Bauza. Thankfully, two United players threw themselves at the effort at blocked it.
GOAL! SWAN 1 SCUN 0: Thanks goodness that Crystal Palace are losing too, because this game has just become a much tougher proposition for The Iron. A cross is clipped in, and David Edgar sends it home bullet-header-style at the back.
25 MIN: Murphy kicks desperately to safety after a defensive mistake nearly let Shefki Kuqi make the score 1-0; but Murph beats him to the ball and smacks it away.
22 MIN: Pleasingly, Scunthorpe have grown into this one a little more now. Josh Wright just played a pass upfield which tried to unleash Garry Thompson on goal, but it was intercepted by the last Swansea defender.
15 MIN: Just in case you hadn't figured, Shefki Kuqi is the danger man at the moment. He just had the vast majority of the crowd on their feet initiating celebrations after he steered a header towards goal, but Murphy managed to beat it away at the pivotal moment.
13 MIN: The home side are dominating, and it comes as a nice little moment of respite when Garry Thompson wins a corner after getting on the end of a through-ball and getting a shot away off a defender. The corner comes in, and as a result United keep the ball in the Swans half for a while; but without threatening.
8 MIN: Shefki Kuqi breaks, but loses his footing at the wrong (or right, from our perspective) moment. That allows Joe Murphy to get just enough of his hand to Kuqi's eventual shot to turn it behind. United are staring down the battle of a roulette gun at the moment. It's sort of like, which Swansea chance is going to result in a goal?
7 MIN: Joe Allen gets the ball outside the area, slightly to the left of the centre and has a punt. It deflects off Josh Wright and goes behind for a corner kick.
5 MIN: Swansea apply pressure, and force Joe Murphy into a save before they hit the crossbar at the end of their next move through a Shefki Kuqi shot.
3 MIN: Some nice passing is strung together in midfield by United, which leads to a long-range effort from Paul Hayes. He hits just wide from about twenty-five yards; but he had de Vries beaten.
KICK-OFF: Nigel Adkins leads his blue-shirted troops into battle. It's Wales versus England - Swansea versus Scunthorpe.
Cyril the Swan, Swansea City's mascot take a tour around the outskirts of the pitch now were within touching distance of kick-off. I thought mascots were meant to be for children - this one certainly isn't - I'm an adult and it scares me! Its neck is at a right-angle to its body - it looks like it's fresh from the gallows!
Browsing through the programme, I find an interview with David Cornell, one of Swansea's goalkeepers. I start trying to read it, and then realise that it's in Welsh ... I flick over the page!
Travelling supporters are not found in abundance today. There's about one-hundred of them housed away to my left in a small corner of the ground - a complete contrast to the amount found at Bramall Lane last week. It is a pretty long journey down here though: it took us over four hours.
The team sheets are in ... There's four changes from Friday for our boys, and the most noteable of these comes with Cliff Byrne taking back a spot in the team at his first attempt. Him aside, Canavan, Josh Wright and McDermott are all new starters. There's no place on the bench for the injured Sam Togwell, but there is one for Matt Godden.
SWAN: De Vries, Williams, Dyer, Monk, Rangel, Bauza, Allen, Gower, Kuqi, Edgar, Cotterill. Subs: Cornell, Tate, Pratley, Orlandi, Pintado, Trundle, Butler.
SCUN: Murphy, Byrne, Canavan, Raynes, Williams, Sparrow, J. Wright, McCann, McDermott, Hayes, Thompson. Subs: Lillis, A. Wright, Hooper, Forte, Woolford, Godden, McNulty.
Ref: Dean Whitestone
Fed and watered, we've now taken up our positions pitchside. That's after a pleasant greeting from the Swansea media man. "Did you have a nice journey down?", he said. "Yes", me and my colleagues unanimously responded. "Good, I always wish people a nice journey down here and a not-so-nice one back" he joked.
Meanwhile, the home team are hardly on cloud nine at the moment after succumbing to Cardiff on Sunday, where they lost both bragging rights and precious points. That means they're attempting to rebel today, as their midfielder, the former Barcelona man Andrea Orlandi declared immediately after that derby loss. "We need to get over it and get three more points on Monday", he chirped.
Scunthorpe can take confidence into this one from the League Cup win they got here on one of the more eventful nights that this season has conjured up. It finished 2-1 to The Iron back in August, when Swansea finished the game with eight men. As home tempers flared both on and off the pitch that prompted some Swansea fans sat in the vicinity of the press box to threaten me and my colleague for wearing our Scunthorpe ties - something I really hope won't be repeated today!
PREAMBLE
Prynhawn da! Croeso i Gymru! In translation, that means 'good afternoon and welcome to Wales', which is where we're based for today's Championship game between Swansea City and Scunthorpe. Interestingly, fifth-placed Swansea have the unfortunate millstone hanging around their necks which defines them rather surprisingly as the lowest scoring team in The Championship (with 34 goals to their name) so far this term. Don't get too excited or expectant though, as their defence is lean and mean, having only shipped a meagre tally of just thirty-three` strikes - a record second only to Newcastle.
