OVER TO YOU!
AS SWANS TAKE A GIANT STEP TOWARDS PREMIER LEAGUE SURVIVAL, CLEMENT THROWS DOWN THE GAUNTLET TO HULL...
SWANSEA City smashed Sunderland to take a giant stride to Premier League safety – with beaming boss Paul Clement telling Hull: “Over to you.” Goals from Fernando Llorente and Kyle Naughton at the Stadium of Light mean that Hull have to beat Crystal Palace in their noon showdown today to realistically stop Swansea from sealing their place in next year’s top-flight.
A Palace win at Selhurst Park will send the Tigers down while not even a draw may be good enough with Swansea’s goal difference now seven goals better than Marco Silva’s side.
Clement – who has previously said he wasn’t sure if he would tune in for the potentially decisive fixture – did warn players and supporters to keep the celebrations on hold until the escape job was 100% finished.
But he cranked up the pressure on both their survival rivals, saying: “It is a big win at a crucial point – we did our bit.
“We’ve done our part this weekend but we don’t think our job is done – it would be wrong of us to think that so, at the moment, we will just be thinking about getting back on the training ground on Monday and getting ready for another big game next week.
“We know this was a really good result for us at a big moment in the season – and there’s a lot of pressure on both teams on Sunday.
“But our focus is on finishing the job because we can’t rely on other teams. We can’t rely on Palace or Hull, we can’t rely on Manchester United in Palace’s last game, we can’t rely on Tottenham in Hull’s.
“We have to get the job done ourselves.”
Still, it is now three wins from four games for Swansea, a return that could already be enough to keep the club among the elite for a seventh straight season.
Whatever happens, a win against West Brom on Sunday will leave all other results irrelevant – and Clement said: “We have had a great run of form at just the right time. But I never thought it was over for us.
“There was a concern when we had a poor run of not playing well at a vital time and the mood was going in the wrong direction.
“But I knew that Stoke game was big because there was still enough games to get valuable points on board. We’ve done that so far and I am proud of the players.”
All the action and reaction from the bottom and the top of the Premier League in today’s Sport on Sunday pullout