Huddersfield Town vs Swansea City. Sky Bet Championship.
The John Smith's Stadium.
Report and highlights from the Sky Bet Championship clash between Huddersfield and Swansea at the John Smith's Stadium as goals from Fraizer Campbell, Lewis O'Brien and two from Duane Holmes saw the Terriers stun the Swans
Saturday 20 February 2021 18:12, UK
Huddersfield blew away an out-of-sorts Swansea 4-1 at the John Smith's Stadium.
The Terriers notched three goals in the space of seven second-half minutes as they sealed a much-needed first win of 2021.
The result eases the pressure on Town boss Carlos Corberan, whose side are now seven points clear of the relegation places.
As for Swansea, they missed a huge opportunity to make ground on second-placed Brentford. Nevertheless, Steve Cooper's side still have two games in hand on the Bees and Watford in third.
Huddersfield started brightly and thought they had opened the scoring after 12 minutes when Fraizer Campbell bundled the ball home from a few yards out after a neat exchange with Lewis O'Brien. However, referee John Brooks quickly chalked it off as O'Brien had strayed offside.
The hosts did take the lead on 22 minutes though, and this time Campbell was not disappointed.
Wing-back Pipa picked out Campbell inside the box and he swept home a shot that glanced in off a post.
Juninho Bacuna then tried his luck from outside the box but his right-footed effort came back off the woodwork.
The game was opening up and Andre Ayew did well to hold off multiple Town defenders before unleashing a fierce drive which Ryan Schofield was equal to.
Swansea were slowly working their way through the gears, and after a few warning shots from Matt Grimes and Ayew, they drew level just before the break.
Conor Hourihane's glorious free-kick from the right edge of the area flew past a helpless Schofield. That continued his excellent scoring run and took his tally to four in five league games.
Whatever Corberan said to his players at half-time, it clearly worked as Town scored three goals in quick succession to put the game out of sight.
First, O'Brien saw his effort fly into the net via a slight nick off a Swansea defender.
Then, Aaron Rowe's delicate through ball picked out Duane Holmes and he fired past Freddie Woodman inside the box.
And Huddersfield were in dreamland on 55 minutes when Holmes hit an absolute peach of a shot that found the top-right corner from outside the box, giving Woodman no chance.
Things went from bad to worse for the shell-shocked Swans, who had to play the final half-hour with 10 men.
Substitute Jordan Morris suffered a nasty-looking knee injury and had to be taken off, with City having already used their full allocation of five changes.
The final quarter of the game passed without any major incident as Town held on for a morale-boosting victory.
Huddersfield's Carlos Corberan: "I think it was really important for us to win today and also the way that we did it. For me, it was important to play offensively. We wanted to have Campbell close to the last line so he could affect more situations. Swansea are a team who play well and have a good coach and play positively.
"We played with a lot of determination and courage and lots of quality, especially in the second half. When you have a negative experience, such as conceding just before half-time, the key thing is the confidence to bounce back. I cannot find one player today who didn't complete the game in the way we wanted."
Swansea's Steve Cooper: "We've only got ourselves to blame for today. If you don't do the basics, at both ends of the pitch, then it can cost you. The goals from Huddersfield were obviously good finishes, but the areas that they got into were ones we worked on a lot to try and prevent them getting into.
"The game was quickly out of sight in 10 or so minutes after the break. We were second best today and in this league, players can hurt you and that's happened. We didn't take enough care of the ball or play with even purpose. Defensively, we were just too passive. We weren't good enough at being ourselves today. It might be fatigue but I'm not going to use that as an excuse."
