Alan Curtis has been a dependable redoubt throughout Swansea City’s time in the Premier League. Before stepping aside for the new manager, Paul Clement, he did his club proud once again as he steered them to victory against Crystal Palace.
Curtis’s last match as the caretaker-manager brought a performance that belied Swansea’s position and their recent wretched form. Joined by Clement in the dugout for the second half, he also made two decisive substitutions to win the game when Àngel Rangel converted Leroy Fer’s long ball with two minutes left. It was a vital three points and confirmed Sam Allardyce has another big job on his hands at Palace.
“You’ll have to excuse the voice, a bit of excitement at the end there,” said Curtis before confirming it was he who had called the shots in the game’s final knockings. “I made the substitutes. There were injuries and players who had been suffering so the changes all sort of fell into place to be fair. Paul came down, he made a real positive contribution. There’s nothing better for any player than having a new manager watching them.”
The home side were being watched by a febrile crowd, with the mood in Selhurst Park worse than in the last days of Alan Pardew’s regime. Whether the atmosphere fed into Palace’s play or not, nerves were already manifest and the home side started terribly.
Swansea had a focus about their approach and confidence on the ball. Palace were either overplaying or short of ideas. Allardyce put this down to fatigue after he chose to select a largely similar side to the one who lost to Arsenal two days previously. He also accepted his players had not performed well enough but saved his strongest words for the referee, Paul Tierney, after he failed to give Palace a penalty in the 32nd minute.
A Wayne Hennessey goal-kick had somehow managed to clear the entire Swansea defence and fell to Christian Benteke who got a touch beyond the onrushing Lukasz Fabianski. The Belgian then went over the keeper and went to ground. Tierney saw no foul and video replays were not conclusive but Allardyce was incensed with the decision.
“The goalie’s cleaned him out,” Allardyce said. “I can’t understand why the ref didn’t give the penalty but maybe I can because he has had very few games in the Premier League and might find it hard to make the big judgments. He got it wrong and he got it massively wrong. If we’d have scored that penalty I don’t think we would have lost that game.”
Swansea took the lead just before half-time with a set piece Big Sam would have been proud of. It came from a typically expert delivery from Gylfi Sigurdsson, which was matched by the run from Alfie Mawson. The 22-year-old centre-half, signed from Barnsley in the summer, ran across the Palace line to flick the ball back from where he had come and inside the near post. It was his first goal for the club.
The crowd booed Palace off vociferously at half-time and then cheered them vigorously back on. Allardyce withdrew Benteke, who had hurt his shoulder falling over, and replaced him with Fraizer Campbell. He also added Bakary Sako for Andros Townsend and suddenly Palace had more zip, even if they struggled to create good chances.
In the 78th minute Sako provoked another penalty shout, bustling his way into the box and flicking the ball past Rangel only for the Spaniard to stop it with his hand. This one was a definite penalty but Tierney could not have seen it because his whistle stayed silent.
For a moment it looked as if Palace had burned themselves out. Swansea were recovering their composure. But then in the 84th minute a moment of quality from Wilfried Zaha brought the scores level. Campbell chased down a long ball and played it wide to Martin Kelly. His first-time cross span across the edge of the box, where Zaha met it with a flying scissor kick. Fabianski could do nothing as it flew past him into the net.
There was bedlam in the ground but still there was time for another twist as Rangel chose the end of the match to turn auxiliary striker. Running on to Fer’s long ball, he took one touch to control and another to finish coolly under Hennessey. Suddenly it was a figurative six-pointer after all.
Clement will now take full charge and Curtis says the former assistant to Carlo Ancelotti believes he can keep Swansea up. “I think that’s why he took the job,” Curtis said. “He had the security of a top job at Bayern Munich but he wanted the challenge. I told him if I was him I would have stayed in Germany.”
