Norwich victory extends nine-game unbeaten run

Swansea City 3 Norwich City 4:Swansea's recent form has produced draws against Chelsea and Liverpool, wins over Newcastle, West Brom and Arsenal and they were fancied by many to bag another three points against Norwich.

But an abject first-half display put paid to those hopes as goals from Steven Whittaker, Sebastien Bassong and Grant Holt gave the visitors a 3-0 half-time lead.

Swansea rallied through goals from Michu and Jonathan de Guzman before Itay Shechter had an equaliser ruled out after Michu was adjudged to have fouled Mark Bunn. Robert Snodgrass then made the win safe for Norwich with a fantastic free-kick, before Michu grabbed a late consolation.

A thrilling encounter was sadly marred by an alleged racist gesture towards Bassong as Norwich celebrated their fourth goal. A 23-year-old Swansea fan was arrested within minutes of the incident.

Norwich manager Chris Hughton voiced his disappointment at the incident, but praised Swansea’s handling of the matter.

Overshadowed

But Hughton did not want his side’s first away win of the season to be overshadowed, and he praised his players for embarking on their current nine-match unbeaten run in the league after making a slow start to the campaign.

The current sequence is Norwich’s best in the Premier League and he said: “I am very proud of the players, they have put in a tough shift in every game . . . we have showed enough resilience to see it through. The players deserve everything, they are the ones who identified that we did not have enough points earlier in the season and went about creating enough to change that.”