Swansea City vs Bristol City. Sky Bet Championship.
Swansea.com StadiumAttendance16,676.
Report and free match highlights from the Sky Bet Championship match between Swansea and Bristol City at the Swansea.com Stadium as goals from Mark Sykes and Sam Bell sealed a comeback win for the Robins.
Saturday 2 September 2023 17:54, UK
Bristol City fought back to register a deserved 2-1 Sky Bet Championship victory in the Swansea sunshine.
Liam Cullen's first goal of the season gave Michael Duff hope that he would be celebrating his maiden league win as Swansea manager.
But Bristol City created a host of chances and had three goals disallowed before being ultimately rewarded by second-half strikes from Mark Sykes and Sam Bell.
Swansea had a frantic deadline day on Friday signing four players - Bashir Humphreys, Josh Tymon, Jamal Lowe and Kristian Pedersen.
But none of the quartet were available to take on opponents who gave a full debut to Taylor Gardner-Hickman following his loan from West Brom.
Sykes had the ball in the net early on but the Bristol City winger had strayed into an offside position.
Swansea struck after 10 minutes as Charlie Patino split the Robins' defence with a delightful threaded pass and Cullen finished left-footed with some aplomb.
The goal failed to settle Swansea, who have won just once this season in the Carabao Cup, as Bristol City dominated first-half proceedings from that point.
Jason Knight curled over, Sykes had a shot blocked and Wells sidefooted straight at Carl Rushworth in the home goal after his exchange with Bell had cut Swansea open.
The Robins' chances kept coming as Matt Grimes cleared Knight's effort off the goal-line, Wells fired over from 20 yards after dispossessing Nathan Wood, and Bell's goal celebrations were curtailed by an eagle-eyed assistant referee.
Patino skewed wide as Swansea enjoyed brief respite, but there was a controversial end to the first half as Naughton sliced down Wells with the striker en route to goal.
Ben Cabango was just about covering Naughton so referee Oliver Langford deemed the offence worthy of a yellow card rather than red.
Bristol City had the ball in the net for a third time from the resulting free-kick, but Knight was guilty of a push and the visitors' growing frustration was evident as Kal Naismith was booked for dissent.
Duff changed the Swansea system at half-time and went from five to four at the back, but the Robins were level within three minutes.
Joe Williams pounced on a home mistake to find Sykes and he galloped clear before cutting inside Wood and burying his shot beyond Rushworth.
Cullen had an instant opportunity to restore Swansea's lead but his shot lacked the accuracy to beat Max O'Leary.
Sykes turned provider for Bristol City's 59th-minute lead, muscling his way through some half-hearted tackling to deliver a cross Bell converted ruthlessly at the far post.
Swansea were inches away from an equaliser when Cabango headed against a post, but that would have been rough justice on visitors who have taken eight points from their opening five games.
Swansea's Michael Duff:
"We've got four new players that will give us a better balance," said Duff.
"There's good competition for places now. People need to put their hands up. The season almost starts now.
"I thought we were poor. I thought we were slow, we were pedestrian, with and without the ball and we didn't do the basics well enough.
"We started the game well on the front foot, went 1-0 up but then went passive. We gave two poor goals away.
"It's a difficult game if you don't do the basics properly. We didn't get on the front foot at all, we weren't aggressive enough."
Bristol City's Nigel Pearson:
"What we talked about (at half-time) is, if we could keep our composure, we knew that we'd continue to create opportunities.
"Let's use the frustration of it to perform. I think that's the big thing.
"There's no good me being in there ranting and raving because there's nothing to rant about, apart from maybe the guy out in the middle.
"I bit my lip. It hurts a bit now! But I'm just pleased that our players got a reward for their performance.
"We created a lot of chances and we have done in our away games so far.
"The goal we conceded was a sloppy one from our perspective, but Swansea didn't create too many chances in that first half.
"They went a bit more direct when they went behind and Max (O'Leary) had to make a couple of saves.
"It was a bit tighter but we felt we looked like creating chances on the counter because we've got pace in the team.
"You've got to move the ball quickly and we always felt we could get some success in wide areas. But to do that you've got to have the intention of getting forward."
