Swansea thrashing gives Carvalhal revenge shot
Carlos Carvalhal will not admit to any vengeance in his heart, but, be sure, he is relishing his FA Cup trip back to Sheffield Wednesday, the club he so almost took to the Premier League, but who sacked him last Christmas Eve.
There he will be back at Hillsborough, a mere 10 weeks after the P45 humiliation, a Premier League manager, with the scalps of Liverpool and Arsenal in his locker, with relegation safety a realistic aim in his sights, and looking to take Swansea to the Cup quarter-finals for the first time in 54 years.
“It will be like going home,” he said. “We achieved two play-offs, something very strong. I will be an Owl forever – but I believe that I will be a Jack forever in future.”
In fact, Carvalhal has so much to brag about with his necessary quick-fire employment, that this eight-goal thumping of poor Notts County – a Cup record for Swansea – will not begin to feature. And neither should it.
Credit to Kevin Nolan’s League Two outfit for advancing this far, but at a scandalously under-populated Liberty Stadium this was about as far away from Cup romance as one can imagine. This display offered so much to Carvalhal, but probably most of all a richly welcome positivity in a headache on selection.
Nolan tried to flood the midfield, resorting to a 4-5-1 and leaving Shola Ameobi on a bench which also included Alan Smith, the 19-time English international. Yet in the event the only person gasping for air was the goalkeeper, Adam Collin.
True, there were a few moments when the minnows burst to the surface and tasted the air; chiefly after Noor Husin’s strike in the 36th minute. But by that time, they were three down.
It was rousing, even exciting, for a while, yet, in truth, Nolan should have been far more positive far earlier. Instead, he barely had time to beseech his men to go forward. County were gone in 60 seconds. That is all it took, after the white rush of the opening flurry, for Tammy Abraham to net his first for four months in the 18th minute and then for the excellent Nathan Dyer to tuck away Abraham’s sumptuous through ball.
And when Dyer struck again on the half-hour, this time from the edge of the box following an irresistible passage culminating in the excellent Luciano Narsingh’s cutback, it was a case of dream over.
To County’s credit they poured forward and Husin’s curler to locate the net off the post offered his team a sniff. Indeed, it was positively alluring in the forthcoming minutes as the ball tantalisingly continued to bounce around the home area.
Inevitably, however, the visitors’ enthusiasm left gaps at the back and so Abraham applied the necessaries to a move which involved at least 10 passes.
From then on, it became brutal, an X-rated video nasty screened live on BBC One. There was to be no response in the second half, apart from the 1,000-odd travelling fans who, so commendably, afforded this tie some atmosphere.
The Swansea support which did turn up had Kyle Naughton to salute, with the fifth, Wayne Routledge with the sixth, Tom Carroll with the seventh and a debut goal for the 20-year-old Daniel James.
Swansea (4-4-1-1) Nordfeldt, Naughton, Bartley, Van der Hoorn (Maric 78), Roberts; Narsingh, Carroll, Clucas (Ki 45), Routledge; Dyer (James 62); Abraham. Subs Olsson, Ayew, Mulder, Fernandez. Booked Clucas.
Notts County (4-5-1) Collin; Hunt, Duffy, Brisley, Dickinson, Grant, Husin (Milsom 62), Virtue, Hawkridge, Alessandra (Forte 62); Stead (Smith 65). Subs Ameobi, Pindroch, Noble, Walker. Booked Virtue.
Referee Martin Atkinson (W Yorkshire).