It has not been an easy start to life in the Premier League for American manager Bob Bradley. Bradley took over Swansea City during the international break at the start of October, but heading in to Thanksgiving weekend, he was still searching for his first Premier League win.
This weekend provided Bradley with a good chance to get it. A home game against Crystal Palace, losers of five in a row.
Palace would jump out to a 1-0 lead, but Swansea hit back with three straight goals. With 17 minutes to play, the Swans had a 3-1 lead and Bradley was looking good.
That’s exactly when things started to get crazy.
Trailing by two goals with just a tick over 16 minutes to play, Crystal Palace took a corner that Swansea just couldn’t defend cleanly.
Game on. Swansea still had a one goal lead, but Crystal Palace could still smell blood. Just over six minutes later, Wilfried Zaha’s cross took a deflection off Swansea captain Jack Cork, putting the scores level.
As bad as things seemed for Swansea, things would get worse. Two minutes later Palace had another corner, and once again Swansea failed to defend it. This time, Crystal Palace striker Christian Benteke was there to make them pay.
A 3-1 lead with 17 minutes to play was suddenly a 4-3 deficit with just six minutes to play. You almost started to feel like Bob Bradley would never get that elusive win. But that’s the beauty of the Premier League, you never know when things are just going to go off the walls crazy.
Swansea would push for their equalizer, and they would get it just as injury time began.
The fourth official would signal seven additional minutes to what was already a wild game. Swansea wouldn’t need seven though, grabbing the winner just two minutes later and the game’s fifth goal in 17 minutes.
There were still five minutes to play, and Crystal Palace would threaten again with another corner kick in the seventh minute of stoppage time, but Swansea City would hold on for the win, making Bob Bradley the first American to ever win a Premier League game.
