Premier League: Swansea wins to move out of relegation zone

With an arm draped around one of his players, Swansea manager Paul Clement walked toward the team’s celebrating fans and held up two of his fingers.

Two games to secure English Premier League survival.

And this relegation battle could go right to the wire.

Swansea was the big winner on Saturday as the fight to stay in the world’s richest domestic league took more twists across three back-toback games.

After witnessing losses for relegation rivals Crystal Palace and then Hull, Swansea beat Everton 1-0 to climb out of the bottom three for the first time in a month. That’s seven points won from the last three games for the Welsh club that looked in such a mess in late December when it fired American coach Bob Bradley.

“It’s one of my proudest moments,” said Clement, a former assistant at Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain, and Chelsea who is starting to look the part as a coach in his own right.

Last-placed Sunderland is already down. Next-to-last Middlesbrough is set to drop, too, on Monday. It looks to be down to three teams — Palace, Swansea or Hull — for the other relegation places.

Palace has 38 points, Swansea 35, and Hull 34. Next week, Hull visits Palace and Swansea is away to Sunderland.

On Saturday, Bournemouth and Stoke clinched another season in the Premier League. Burnley and Watford are all but mathematically safe.

Swansea 1, Everton 0: The all-important goal by Fernando Llorente ended up being a stroke of luck.

Jordan Ayew floated over a cross from the right and Llorente leaped highest at the far post, bundling the ball home with his left shoulder. For one of the best headers of the ball in the league, it was an ugly but decisive finish.

This win for Swansea built on its victory over Stoke and a draw at Manchester United over the last two weeks. Hull 0, Sunderland 2: Hull coach Marco Silva’s 41-match unbeaten home record as a manager ended at the worst possible time.

Billy Jones and Jermain Defoe scored second-half goals for Sunderland, which was relegated last weekend when Hull drew at Southampton thanks to a last-minute penalty save.

Silva had not lost a home-league game since 2014, a period taking in spells in charge of Estoril, Sporting Lisbon, Olympiakos, and now four months at Hull.

The result also was a boost for Middlesbrough, which stayed alive ahead of its trip to Chelsea Monday.