Swansea v Hull Competition - Sky Bet Championship Venue - Swansea.com Stadium Date - 25 November 2023 Kick off - 3:00pm Following their 2-3 defeat away at high flying Ipswich, next up for Michael Duff’s Swansea squad is a home match against Hull City. Ipswich Town moved level on points with Championship leaders Leicester City as they recovered from an early setback to beat the Swans. Jay Fulton headed the Swans in front seven minutes into a breathless first half dominated by Ipswich, who equalised with Jack Taylor's spectacular long-range strike before Conor Chaplin fired them into the lead. The home side would have been out of sight by half-time were it not for a series of saves by Swansea goalkeeper Carl Rushworth, but he could not stop George Hirst extending Ipswich's advantage with a penalty after the break. Swansea's Liam Cullen was then sent off after receiving a second yellow card and, although Jamal Lowe scored a fine individual goal for the visitors in added time, the result was never truly in doubt. Whilst the Swans were losing at Portman Road, Liam Delap's late strike finally found a way through Huddersfield's stubborn rearguard to make it three wins from four for Hull. The Manchester City loanee struck as the game moved into added time just when it seemed a fighting effort from the Terriers would earn them a second successive goalless draw. Delap had hit the bar minutes earlier, in a game of few chances, but snapped up his late opportunity to give Hull a much-needed fillip after they lost at West Brom last week. Defeat leaves Huddersfield with just one win in their last 10 games to leave them one place and four points above the relegation zone while the three points boosts Hull to the fringes of the play-off places. The Swans first played Hull 98 years ago this month, and the overall record in the series is 32 wins for the Swans, 30 for the Tigers and 20 matches drawn. In the corresponding fixture last season, the Swans ran out comfortable 3-0 winners: Turning to Saturday, Dean Whitestone will be the man in the middle. The Northamptonshire official will take charge of a Swans fixture for the first time this season, having last overseen the defeat at Luton last season. Whitestone has no shortage of experience, and has been refereeing for long enough to have had the whistle for a Swansea game during the club’s previous stint in the Championship. So far this term he has taken charge of 12 games in all competitions, handing out 39 yellow cards and one red. Whitestone will be assisted by Daniel Leach and Robert Merchant, while Scott Oldham is the fourth official. The Tigers are not far outside the play-off places but have probably not found the consistency they would want although there have been encouraging signs with a run of three wins in their last four games. They have claimed some notable scalps having toppled leaders Leicester at the King Power Stadium earlier in the campaign. Of their seven Championship wins this season, four have come on their travels, so they will travel in a confident mood. Michael Duff says his injured Swansea City stars are making progress in their bid to return to full fitness. But he doesn't expect to receive any potential boosts ahead of Saturday's clash with Hull. “Josh Key's close," he said. "Myko [Kuharevich] is on the grass. Joe Allen's been on the grass. He's not integrated into training, but is on the grass. Azeem's on the grass too, so they are getting fitter, but they're still not available to us. Among the lengthy absentees are Nathan Wood and Josh Ginnelly. The latter remains unlikely to play any further part in the current campaign, while Wood is still expected to out until the end of the year. As for a forecast, I’m going for a 1-1 draw
It's a 1 - 0 home win for me. Probably courtesy of an own goal with them missing 4 sitters. Nothing to do with the prediction league And for an informed and deliberated judgement - no idea!
Been back home about an hour or so. Whilst we were 2-0 up at half-time, the main difference was that we took our chances in the opening 45 minutes and they didn’t Whilst our defence is far from perfect, at times, particularly in the first half, it performed well, although if they had had their shooting boots on, they’d have scored a couple. Arguably, the critical point came before half-time when Yates had a good chance to put us 3 up - that would most likely have seen us bank the 3 points. As it was, their Manager rolled the dice in a positive fashion, made 2 substitutions at half time and that proved to be the decisive factor. For his part Duff basically did nothing to combat the changes made by his opposite number. Overall, a draw was probably the fairest result. Leeds away on Wednesday
