Conor delighted with mean Swans
CONOR Hourihane admits Swansea City’s mentality to not concede goals is the best he’s ever witnessed in his playing career.
The Aston Villa loanee struck his third goal in as many league outings for the Swans to add to Andre Ayew’s first-half effort as Steve Cooper’s men clinched a 2-0 triumph over Norwich City on Friday night.
The shut-out was the 15th Swansea have kept in the Championship this season as they moved back up to second place in the table courtesy of their victory at the Liberty Stadium.
And Hourihane says he’s been hugely impressed by the determination shown by Swansea when it comes to keeping the ball out of their own net.
“We were coming into this game with confidence, no matter who we were playing, whether it was someone at the top of the league or down the bottom of the league,” he told Sky Sports.
“Since I’ve come in the lads have been brilliant.
“We keep going.
“We pride ourselves on that [clean sheet record].
“The mentality to keep the ball out of the back of the net is something like I haven’t seen before, it’s top class.
“Clean sheets win you games, so I’m delighted.”
Hourihane’s stunning 48thminute strike means he is already the club’s joint-third top scorer in the league this season.
And speaking after the win against Daniel Farke’s outfit, the Irishman re-iterated his desire to play football having struggled for game- time in the opening half of the campaign at Villa Park.
“I’m loving it. Delighted to get the opportunity to play. I love playing football. Your career is too short to be sitting around,” he added.
“I have my own high standards. I’m still hungry for more and hopefully in the coming weeks that’ll be the case.
“I think we’ve got a good mix of experienced lads like myself, Benno [Ryan Bennett], Kyle Naughton, Andre Ayew.
“There’s a good mix, a good energy and good heads.
“There’s a really nice balance and we keep moving on to the next one.”
Speaking about Hourihane in his post-match press conference, Cooper said: “Once we lost Morgan [Gibbs-White], we didn’t see the best of Morgan in the end because of the injury and the call back to Wolves, I felt that we needed more of a player that you fancy to get goals.
“Yan [Dhanda] will do it as well, he’s shown in the past he can create and score goals, but Conor’s numbers are really good for a midfield player.
“A lot of that is with set plays as well which is something else that we have now.
“It’s great that he’s come in and scored goals, but it’s not much of a surprise because of his previous numbers in seasons gone by.”