Swansea 2-2 Sunderland
It has been easy to get carried away in the very early success of Michael Laudrup at Swansea City. Not only have the Sawns been winning games (taking a maximum 6 points from their first 2 games) but they have also been great fun to watch with 8 goals scored and 0 conceded. Now however was their first test as they sought to defeat Martin O'Neill's well drilled Sunderland team.
Sadly the day didn't start well for the Swans who had the influential Neil Taylor stretchered off early into the match after suffering a serious injury to his leg an in an innocuous looking collision. Despite looking like a foul (by Taylor incidentally) no one expected the resulting injury which has been reported as a fracture which will keep Taylor out for a prolonged time period.
The injury to Taylor aside the game was pretty incident free for almost 40 minutes until Steven Fletcher pounced on a poor Ashley Williams back pass to put the Black Cats 1 up. Within minutes Swansea had equalised as Michu and Nathan Dyer linked up brilliantly to feed Wayne Routledge who smashed the ball home and it appeared that we were going to go into the half honour even. Fletcher had failed to read the script and after tapped in a goal deep into stoppage time.
Swansea refused to be beaten and came out for the second half recharged forcing the game relentlessly. Eventually the pressure paid off with Michu heading in to draw the Swans level and it appeared that if a winner was to be scored it would come from the home side. Sadly the match then turned on a controversial decision by the referee who sent off Chico Flores for a high foot on Louis Saha who milked the challenge for all it was worth. Although Swansea continued to be the better team they couldn't quite secure the 3 points.
In the post match interviews Michael Laudrup certainly didn't seem too disappointed to see his 100% winning record fall apart, preferring to look at the positives which included seeing his team battle back from being down twice. This, to me anyway, appears to be a great outlook by the manager who will feel unlucky on a number of levels. Not only will the injury to Taylor be a genuinely massive blow but a possible suspension for Michu is also an issue however the team looked solid with just 10 men. The sale of Scott Sinclair didn't even seem to be mentioned and instead Swansea just their job of playing gorgeous football. Whilst, yes, they did concede goals they refused to sell out the philosophy of good football and were unfortunate not to have bagged the win. They are certainly giving fans their value for money and doing much better than expected.
Sunderland manager Martin O'Neill will have to be proud of his team. Not only were they coming off a 2 week break following their game with Arsenal on the opening day of the season but they looked solid against a very tough Swansea side. The signing of Steven Fletcher looks exceptional and really seems to give Sunderland some bit up top. Whilst the Black Cats will be glad to remain unbeaten they will not be happy with the fact they were out played even after the sending off which had the potential to open the game up for Sunderland.
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