Practice pays off with Ayew's winner

21st December
First team
Steve Cooper

Preparations paid off at Luton Town as Steve Cooper revealed Andre Ayew’s winner was straight off the training pitch.

Ayew chested home from close range to send the Swans up to sixth in the Championship at the halfway stage of the season.

The build up to the goal saw Ben Wilmot send a perfect cross-field pass for Bersant Celina, who drew the attention of two Luton markers. The Kosovan picked out the onrushing sub Jay Fulton, who darted into the box, and his deflected cross found Ayew a yard out and the Ghanaian chested home his tenth goal of the campaign.

Andre Ayew

“It came from a move that we’ve been working on,” revealed Cooper.

“It was an easy finish but you’ve got to be there to do that.

“Andre has a fantastic knack of being in the right place at the right time.

“We wanted to keep Andre and Bersant out wider today as the pitch was narrow and because of the formation Luton played.

“The message for them both, in particular Bersant, was to be positive and get into one-on-ones.

“We knew we could get Bersant into positions at the edge of the box to play crosses in. But we anticipated that Luton would give him a lot of attention, so that opened up an opportunity for someone else.

“That person was Jay, and he did really well to get onto the pass and cross it for Andre. Jay continued the good work that Tom Carroll put in during the game, and we pressed and pressed and the breakthrough was a reward for our effort.”