Swansea City edge a Premier League win over Norwich City that will not live long in the memory
Neil Taylor celebrates Gylfi Sigurdsson's Swansea City match-winner against Norwich City. Picture by Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd - Credit: Paul Chesterton/Focus Images Ltd
Swansea stand-in Alan Curtis admitted Francesco Guidolin may have been in the best place to avoid watching a fraught 1-0 Premier League win over Norwich City.
Guidolin has missed the Swans' back-to-back wins in the last few days with a chest infection that has required a hospital stay for the experienced Italian.
Curtis expects to hand control back to the newly-appointed manager for this weekend's league trip to Bournemouth as Swansea look to end any lingering survival concerns after Gylfi Sigurdsson's second-half winner against the Canaries.
'It was a strange game. Whatever I said to them beforehand it clearly didn't work. I thought we were really poor in the first half,' said Curtis. 'When it's two teams who need the points it affects things. It was one of the worst games of the season. I think both sides got caught up in the tension and the enormity of what it meant. They needed the points, exactly the same as ourselves, and it affected the play so as a spectacle it was quite poor.
'We were hanging on a bit at the end. I don't think we were hanging on necessarily through good play from Norwich, I just felt we got a little bit tense again, and possibly they could have equalised, but I felt over the second 45 we did deserve it.'
Sigurdsson calmly finished former Norwich City midfielder Leroy Fer's pass in a dominant spell for the hosts immediately after the interval.
'The goal came from one of the best moves of the game, and Gylfi's finish was superb,' said Curtis. 'We made one change at half-time and controlled the game for long periods in the second half. We invited them on to us at the end, but I did feel that, overall, we deserved the victory.
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'It's a big statement. It gives ourselves some breathing space between us and the bottom clubs, but we're still only on 33 points, which is not enough for safety. There is still plenty of work to do. We stressed that after the game. Enjoy the moment but we we'll be back in on Tuesday to focus on getting another massive three points at Bournemouth.
'If we can get a win, then fantastic, but we need to put in a performance. We knew our next three fixtures would probably define our season, and that's just one out of the way now. The next two are bigger if anything.'
