John Carver had claimed Swansea’s visit was a “World Cup final” but it ended in familiarly crushing disappointment for Newcastle United’s head coach as his side sank to a seventh straight defeat.
As Garry Monk celebrated reaching the 50-point mark – a Premier League record for eighth-placed Swansea –Newcastle were left five points above the bottom three. In mitigation, Carver’s squad is woefully under-staffed and his switch to a diamond formation prompted an initially much improved performance.
“Unlike last week there’s not many in the dressing room I’m really critical of,” said a man forced to retreat into his dugout during a second half when he was cruelly abused by a couple of moronic fans. “But when you’re on a run like ours confidence is low and you could see it draining.
“I’m aware of the league table but it’s all about us, not anyone else. We’ve got four massive games coming up [away at Leicester and QPR and at home to West Brom and West Ham] and we’re not ready to throw in the towel. I know I’m getting stick from the crowd but I’ll take it on the chin and fight until the end.”
As Carver spoke, the cautious optimism he must have felt during an encouraging first half had long since evaporated and the moment Ayoze Pérez tapped the ball into an unguarded net from three yards seemed to belong to a different world.
On an afternoon punctuated by slapdash clearances – mostly from Newcastle – Jordi Amat’s error in the wake of a fine run and cross from the much improved Emmanuel Rivière left Swansea pulled horribly out of shape and Pérez well placed to capitalise.
For a while Newcastle controlled the tempo, pressing with an intensity unseen in recent weeks. As promised the 34th minute saw virtually the entire stadium getting to their feet and variously chanting “If you hate Ashley stand up” and “We want Ashley out of our club.” The timing was a reference to the £34m left lying in Newcastle’s bank account by Mike Ashley, the club’s owner, for “cash flow purposes” in a season which has left Carver’s squad alarmingly skeletal.
It would ultimately prove illusory but at that point he appeared to have made a decent job of air-brushing his team’s manifold deficiencies.
With the diamond sparkling, his latest ersatz ensemble were playing some nice stuff featuring pleasing width and neat passing interchanges. In one particularly tone-raising cameo Rivière forced Lukasz Fabianski into a stellar save after cleverly playing Vurnon Anita in before subsequently meeting his cross.
“We were in control and defending set-pieces, our real achilles heel, was my only worry,” said Carver.
His worst fears were duly realised as Gylfi Sigurddson whipped in a corner and the unmarked Benfica loanee Nélson Oliveira scored his first goal in English football by heading beyond Tim Krul from 10 yards.
It marked a turning point for Swansea. Monk’s players emerged for the second half in rejuvenated mood and Sigurdsson swiftly provided them with the lead. His crisply clever finish came at the end of a slick, incisive move initiated by Krul’s sub-standard kick.
It facilitated Jefferson Montero’s advance from the left, Oliveira’s cute dummy and Sigurdsson’s first-time, 10-yard shot.
Few seemed surprised when Jack Cork tapped Swansea’s third goal home. Prefaced by a sharp counter-attack it saw Oliveira display an enviable change of pace as he accelerated down the right channel before picking out Cork, the ball passing through the struggling Mike Williamson’s legs en route.
A glimmer of Geordie hope was about to appear on the horizon in the shape of Siem de Jong stepping off the bench. A £6m playmaking signing from Ajax last summer, the Dutchman has spent the season sidelined by first a thigh injury and then a collapsed lung. Here he reduced the deficit by cushioning Jack Colback’s lofted cross before volleying beyond Fabianski’s grasp.
“De Jong was the shining light,” said Carver. “You can see why he’s a top player.”
Despite some subsequent, superior, touches even the De Jong factor could not quite spoil Monk’s party. “Very satisfying,” he said of reaching that 50-point landmark. “I’m extremely proud.”
