Report | Luton Town 1 Swansea City 1
On a cold, blustery afternoon, Swansea City battled through challenging conditions to secure a 1-1 draw against Luton Town at Kenilworth Road.
The Swans had to overcome a delayed kick-off due to a medical emergency in the crowd, which thankfully ended with the Luton fan in a stable condition.
Swansea went behind through Elijah Adebayo, who latched onto a short back pass to round the keeper and score. The Swans responded well and forced Kaminski into nine saves throughout the match. It was Matt Grimes’ excellent strike from a low Josh Tymon corner that levelled it for the Swans.
Swansea started strongly, with Liam Cullen’s deflected shot off Žan Vipotnik forcing a save from Luton goalkeeper Thomas Kaminski in the 3rd minute. Luton responded with Adebayo’s glancing header just wide in the 6th minute.
Harry Darling had a goal-bound header comfortably saved in the 13th minute. However, it was Adebayo who broke the deadlock, capitalising on a short back pass to make it 1-0 to Luton in the 17th minute.
The Swans nearly equalized after great work by Josh Tymon down the left, forcing a strong save from Kaminski. Then, Myles Peart-Harris tried to direct a ball goal-bound that went straight at the keeper.
Swansea ended the first half strongly when Liam Cullen’s 25-yard strike took a deflection for a corner, from which Swansea went close to equalising through Matt Grimes' cross and Josh Tymon’s header.
Early in the second half, Luton nearly doubled their lead through Adebayo in the 48th minute, but Lawrence Vigouroux pulled off a great save down to his right.
Swansea’s Gonçalo Franco had two excellent strikes on goal in the 51st and 55th minutes, both well saved by Kaminski.
Swansea then looked to the bench in search of an equaliser, making changes in the 60th minute, and bringing on Florian Bianchini and Jisung Eom for Vipotnik and Ronald.
It was in the 63rd minute that the equaliser came for Swansea when Matt Grimes scored an unbelievable strike from a drilled Josh Tymon corner.
Eom started to have an impact on the game, and his cross found Peart-Harris, whose ball across was held by Kaminski. Then Franco put Bianchini through on goal, but Kaminski was equal to the strike.
Swansea nearly won it late on; however, Eom couldn’t connect cleanly on a great Bianchini cross, and his flicked header went wide. The match ended 1-1.
A massive shout-out to the unbelievable away support and all the Swans fans who made the journey despite the adverse weather conditions.
Swansea City: Lawrence Vigouroux, Josh Key, Ben Cabango, Harry Darling, Josh Tymon; Matt Grimes (captain), Gonçalo Franco (Joe Allen 79), Liam Cullen; Ronald (Jisung Eom 60), Myles Peart-Harris (Azeem Abdulai 88), Žan Vipotnik (Florian Bianchini 60).
Unused Substitutes: Jon McLaughlin, Jay Fulton, Nathan Tjoe-A-On, Cyrus Christie, Kyle Naughton.
Luton Town: Thomas Kaminski, Amari’i Bell (Mads Andersen 81), Mark McGuinness, Tom Holmes, V. Moses, Jordan Clark, Marvelous Nakamba, Tom Krauß, Daiki Hashioka, Elijah Adebayo (Jacob Brown 70), Carlton Morris (captain).
Unused Substitutes: Tahith Chong, Joe Johnson, Tim Krul, Pelly Mpanzu, Z. Nelson, Joe Taylor, Cauley Woodrow.
Referee: James Bell
Attendance: 11,264