Nathan Dyer was the match winner for the Swans this afternoon as they gained three points in a hard fought encounter with Burnley - a result that kept up our 100% start to the season.

A win next weekend over West Brom and we will have recorded our best Premier League start after we equalled our start today from two years ago when we won both our opening fixtures.

And only Chelsea - the title favourites - stand between us and the top of the league this evening with our opponents on the day remaining pointless two games into their top flight return.

In truth the performance today was nowhere near as strong as the performance last week although we did waste some great chances to score with Wilfried Bony extremely guilty in the first half with a free header that pretty much everyone in the Liberty Stadium assumed he was about to head into the net.

Thankfully these days as well we have a keeper who is keen to command his area and Fabianski never really looked like he was going to be beaten despite the space that we were affording Burnley - particularly in the second half - as we gave the ball away cheaply. Jonjo Shelvey was brilliant last week at Old Trafford but was the complete opposite today as he looked a player who was low on confidence and never really got into the game. Had we had a viable alternative on the bench then I suspect he would have been spared of his misery but it was not the case and he lasted the ninety minutes.

I thought Angel Rangel had one of his better days today in defence as did Neil Taylor although he was pulled out of position a couple of times towards the end of the game whilst both Ash and Amat were solid enough without ever looking completely comfortable and it is definitely for me just a matter of time before Fernandez is in the team and adding a little more composure and steel to the defensive role.

Going forward both Nath and Routs had good first halves and faded in the second - although that could be said of the team as a whole - and eventually both were replaced although in the case of Routs that was more a time wasting exercise in the second half rather than anything else.

As well as Bony's free header there were other chances spurned in a first half where we were always on top but Burnley looked dangerous on the break. As the game wore on it was us who were resulted to breakouts and trying to push forward but for me - as much as they can consider themselves unlucky - Burnley look a side who are destined for a season inside the bottom 6 and their finishing must improve if they are to have any chance of staying up.

Nathan took his goal brilliantly as he capitalised on hesitation from the defender and raced clear of the defence for the only goal but when they talk about 'winning ugly' this is the kind of win that they mean with the Swans never anywhere near the top of our game but just about doing enough to secure the three points.

And the only thing that really matters come the end of the season is a points tally and for now we have the maximum available of six and that makes for a very comfortable feeling at this point in time. How wonderful would it be if we took that to nine next Saturday?

A win is a win!

Photo: Action Images

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