Swansea 2 Huddersfield 0: Tammy Abraham delivers his first Premier League double to lift Liberty gloom
A first home win of the season for Swansea City and - not surprisingly considering we are now deep into October - one with that vital feel to it. Tammy Abraham’s brace hauled Paul Clement’s men out of the bottom three and, at the same time, lifted plenty of the gloom hanging over The Liberty.
The Welsh side had been struggling for goals – just one in their previous four games and one in their first three home games of the campaign, all of which ended in defeat.
And with Wilfried Bony out with a hamstring injury picked up playing for Ivory Coast in the week, there were a few nervous glances at a team sheet also missing the other big transfer-day capture - Renato Sanches - the 20 year-old straining his thigh for Portugal.
But in their young Chelsea loanee they found a striking saviour to convert their possession. Four goals in eight games is not bad by anyone’s standards, but for a young man less than two weeks out of his teenage years it is, to be obvious, extremely positive.
Certainly, Clement was glad of Abraham’s contribution. The word “crisis” would no doubt have been evoked in the event of another defeat and one only had to observe the manager’s all-action performance in the technical defeat to realise what it meant.
“It was an important game for us, based on how we’ve been playing at home and how we’ve been attacking,” he said. “From the first whistle we showed the intent. It’s another clean sheet in the Premier league - that’s four out of eight this season and that’s not easy to do do. But we also found the attacking impetus we haven’t had. We know Tammy can do that - he has a good smell of where he needs to be. That is his best overall performance for Swansea.”
In the eighth minute, the England Under-21 international thought he had beaten Jonas Lossl with a cute effort from the angle. But the goalkeeper was as alert as he was agile and Huddersfield survived. Until a real Danish bloomer just before the break.
There seemed little danger when Philip Billing passed back to Lossl in the 42nd minute, but the international, on loan from Mainz, had a brain zap, passing it straight to Tom Carroll, who pulled it back for Abraham to slide home via a clever step over from Jordan Ayew.
Three minutes into the second half, it was another gift for Abraham, this time from a team-mate. Luciano Narsingh fizzed into a breaking run before being halted in his tracks by Aaron Mooy. The Australian midfielder, brought on at half-time for Jonathan Hogg, was unlucky that his tackle found Ayew, who was himself unfortunate as his deft chip over Lossl was going in until Abraham applied the final touch.
For their part, Huddersfield did not have much to show for their efforts, apart from five yellow cards which neatly summed up the agricultural nature of some of their challenges. Tom Ince should have put away Rajiv van La Parra’s floated cross in the 27th minute and, a few minutes later, Ince had every right to feel aggrieved when seemingly brought down in the area by Martin Olsson.
However, at least referee Paul Tierney was even-handed in his bemusing decisions. No, it was not a good afternoon for the Lancastrian official. Or, indeed, for the Yorkshire visitors. Since winning their first two games, they have picked up three points from a possible 18. Sprints and marathons come to mind.
