Kuqi Goal Gives Swans Win At Derby County

Shefki Kuqi’s headed goal from Cotterill’s cross on 66 minutes was enough to give Swansea City a vital 1-0 win against an in-form Derby County side.

Paulo Sousa went back to his more favoured 4-5-1 formation and made further changes to his starting line-up. Garry Monk was out with a back injury so Tate and Williams partnered each other in the heart of defence, as Richards kept his place at left back. Cotterill returned to the left wing and Kuqi started up front.

We lost Andrea Orlandi early on as he was forced off after 15 minutes with an injury, Mark Gower came on as his replacement.

After a tightly contested first half, all the action, controversy and incidents came after the break as both sides ended the match with 10 men.

Paulo Sousa’s team were handed a lifeline when McEveley was shown a second yellow card after a foul on Nathan Dyer, and from the resulting free-kick Kuqi headed home from a good free-kick cross delivered by Cotterill.

Gorka Pintado came on after 62 minutes but he was only on the pitch for 8 minutes after a two-footed challenge on Robbie Savage, a straight red was shown and a massive brawl followed, which forced the stewards and police to get involved to ease the situation.

With both sides back to even numbers, it was game on now as the momentum was back with the home side, as they were given a boost in their hopes to get a point from the game.

Tonge went closest from a free-kick which struck the bar, and fortuntely for us the rebound shot was fired over.

The Swans managed to hang on to a 1-0 win this time, after holding firm during a long 6 minutes of injury time.

Today’s win was a massive one in our search of a top 6 place this season. The 3 points, which we really needed after dropping 4 in our last 2 games, puts us 4 in front of our arch rivals Cardiff City who are below us in 5th.