Goals from Nathan Broadhead and Conor Chaplin have given Town a 2-1 half-time lead against Swansea at the Swansea.com Stadium.

Town boss Kieran McKenna made one change with Chaplin replacing Wes Burns. Chaplin, who was left out of the XI for the first time in the Championship this season ahead of Wednesday’s 4-0 win at Millwall, came back into the centre of the three behind central striker Kieffer Moore with Omari Hutchinson moving back out to the right.

Broadhead was making his 50th Championship appearance, while Harry Clarke made his 50th appearance for the Blues.

George Edmundson returned to the bench with Axel Tuanzebe dropping out of the 20-man squad. Striker Ali Al-Hamadi was also among the subs against the club where he started his career.

Swansea made four changes from the team which lost 4-0 at home to Leeds on Tuesday with Kyle Naughton, Joe Allen, Ollie Cooper and Jerry Yates coming in for Bashir Humphreys, Jay Fulton, Przemyslaw Placheta and Liam Cullen.

The game got under way in persistent drizzle with water spraying off the ball as it was passed across the sodden surface.

The home side saw most of the ball in the early stages but without threatening as both teams sought to settle into the conditions.

As the game passed the 10-minute mark, the Blues started to gain control and on 11 Massimo Luongo first struck a shot from just outside the box which looked on target until it struck Chaplin, then moments later Leif Davis hit an effort from the left of the area which home keeper Carl Rushworth palmed over.

Following the resultant corner, the ball was returned from the left and Moore, booed by the Swansea fans for his previous Cardiff connections, rose high to nod wide, the wet ball perhaps sliding off the striker’s head.

But the travelling Town fans behind the goal at the other end, didn’t have to wait much longer for a goal.

In the 14th minute, Hutchinson battled with Josh Tymon for a loose ball a third of the way inside the Swans half and stabbed the ball forward for Broadhead, sending the Wales international through on goal. Rushworth held his ground and the Town top scorer dinked his 11th goal of the season to the keeper’s right and into the net, his first senior domestic goal in his home country.

Swansea might well have levelled in the 18th minute when Jerry Yates scuffed a first time shot having been found unmarked 14 yards out from a Jamie Paterson cross following a free-kick on the right.

Moore will feel he should have scored his fourth Town goal in four games in the 23rd minute when he was found at the far post from a corner from the right, but the Wales international again headed the wrong side of the post.

Town continued to look the most likely scorers of the game’s second goal, although while not having it all their own way, and on 29 Chaplin found Moore on the left of the box from where the big frontman hit a shot which was too close to Rushworth.

A minute later, Davis was shown the game’s first yellow card for a foul on Brazilian winger Ronald wide on the right.

And from the set piece, the Swans equalised. The ball was swung into the box, Ben Cabango nodded back across goal and Yates helped it on into the net off the inside of the post.

Having levelled, Swansea seemed to up the tempo and the Blues found themselves under a spell of pressure, Paterson sending over a dangerous ball in the 32nd minute which Town did well to clear.

However, in the 35th minute, the Blues went back in front. Davis was sent away down the left, his excellent first touch taking him beyond his man, before he cut back to Chaplin on the edge of the area, from where the Town forward confidently smashed his 10th goal of the season past Rushworth to the keeper’s left.

The Town fans at the other end gleefully celebrated a very familiar goal, Davis’s assist was the left-back’s 12th of the season, while it was Chaplin’s 50th goal for the Blues and the 100th of his career.

Town went looking for a third, Davis crossing from the left in the 40th minute and a defender’s toe just taking it away from Moore.

Swansea huffed and puffed as they looked for a second equaliser in the spell before the break but without causing Vaclav Hladky a serious issue.

Town were worth their lead at the break having found their feet after a start in which both teams tried to get used to the conditions.

Hutchinson did well to win the ball and thread Broadhead in for the forward’s well executed goal, while the Blues will be disappointed to have conceded from a set play.

Davis once again did superbly down the left to create Town’s second with Chaplin showing the sort of finishing which has been the hallmark of his time at Town.

The game is far from won with Swansea having created one or two moments of danger and with the conditions likely to cause mistakes as the teams tire in the second half.

Swansea City: Rushworth, Naughton, Cabango, Wood, Tymon, Allen, Grimes (c), Ronald, Cooper, Paterson, Yates. Subs: Fisher, Fulton, Darling, Placheta, Patino, Kuharevich, Cullen, Sagoe, Lissah.

Town: Hladky, Clarke, Woolfenden, Burgess, Davis, Morsy (c), Luongo, Hutchinson, Chaplin, Broadhead, Moore. Subs: Walton, Edmundson, Travis, Humphreys, Harness, Burns, Sarmiento, Jackson, Al-Hamadi. Referee: John Busby (Oxfordshire).

Photo: Matchday Images

blueboy1981 added 17:04 - Feb 17 Well Done Boys - we need it to continue, the pressure is increasingly on to avoid those Play Off’s !
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