Ayew’s superb volley makes Bees pay for their sloppy finishing

ANDRE AYEW scored a brilliant late winner to really make Brentford pay for what is looking like a promotion death wish. after 66 minutes for a reckless challenge on Connor Roberts.

Just before that Pontus Jansson sent Rhian Brewster tumbling but Ayew’s resulting spot kick was a bit casual and keeper David Raya made a great one-handed stop.

Swansea take a one-goal lead into Wednesday’s second leg and the Bees’ wastefulness in front of goal may end up costing them. These two teams could hardly have had more contrasting routes to the playoffs and it remained to be seen whether the psychological side of that would have any effect.

Swansea clambered in at the last possible moment and in extraordinary fashion by overhauling a five-goal deficit to nip into sixth place at the expense of Nottingham Forest.

This was almost a free hit for Steve Cooper’s men against a

Brentford side still kicking themselves for tossing away a ticket to go up automatically.

They had put together eight successive wins to ghost into second spot, but then blew up with defeats to lowly Stoke and Barnsley. What that had done to them mentally is anyone’s guess.

All the onus was on the Bees and the one thing in their favour yesterday was they had won both of their meetings with the Swans this season, so at least were not psychologically scarred on that front.

They might well have been in front after nine minutes when only a great one-handed stop by Erwin Mulder kept out a cheeky back header from Ollie Watkins.

But then it was Brentford who had their keeper to thank, Raya reacting superbly to beat away a stinging shot from Brewster midway through the first half.

Raya had a lucky escape when Ayew’s header struck a post and then when Brewster was first to the rebound, he completely fluffed his header from just a couple of yards out.

Said Benrahma should have done better than fire over, Mathias Jensen curled a shot wide and Bryan Mbeumo failed to even make a connection six yards out when he took a wild swing at the ball.

Bees boss Frank will be praying his men are not punished because the last few weeks have been nothing short of a horror story for them.

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