Newcastle United’s magical season continues as they beat Swansea City 2-0 today, a win that has the Toon Army dreaming of Europe. The win lifted Newcastle above Chelsea into fifth place in the league, just two points off Arsenal and Tottenham in the race for third.
Both Newcastle goals were scored by Papiss Demba Cisse, who is fast becoming the signing of the season. Cisse joined Newcastle from German team Freiburg in January for a reported 10 million pounds and has now scored nine goals in his first eight games for Newcastle.
The Newcastle goals were classic counter-attacks as Swansea totally dominated possession but lacked Newcastle’s cutting edge in front of goal.
In the first half, Swansea had the ball a remarkable 80% of the time, bur they trailed 1-0 as Newcastle took advantage of their one opportunity when Cisse ran onto Yohan Cabaye’s perfectly weighted through-ball and stroking a low finish into the corner from just inside the area.
Gylfi Sigurdsson, the Premier League’s player of the month for March after scoring five goals in his last five games, came closest to equalizing for Swansea, drawing two good saves out of Tim Krul and also shooting just wide.
But Swansea was finished off 21 minutes from time by Cisse, who clipped a curling effort over Dutch goalkeeper Michel Vorm from 10 yards after again being supplied by Cabaye.
Swansea stayed 11th in the standings after losing a third game in a row for the first time since being promoted.
