Fulham vs Swansea City. Sky Bet Championship.
Craven CottageAttendance16,113.
Report and highlights from the Sky Bet Championship clash between Fulham and Swansea at Craven Cottage as Aleksandar Mitrovic's first-half hat-trick steered the Cottagers to victory on Wednesday night
Wednesday 29 September 2021 23:04, UK
Aleksandar Mitrovic scored a hat-trick to fire Fulham back to winning ways in the Sky Bet Championship as they beat Swansea 3-1.
The Serbian striker struck all three of his goals in the first half - albeit with the first coming from an offside position - to steer the Cottagers to a first win in three games on Wednesday night, moving them back to within two points of leaders West Brom.
Swansea, who had grabbed a goal back through Jamie Paterson between Mitrovic's second and third, were largely outplayed all night at Craven Cottage. It leaves them with 10 points from as many games.
There was huge controversy about the Fulham opener, and it may lead to further calls for VAR to be introduced to the Championship, as Mitrovic took advantage of being in an offside position after 12 minutes to latch onto a Tim Ream header, before turning and finishing past Ben Hamer.
The second goal was brilliant. A sweeping counter started by Joe Bryan ended with Neeskens Kebano crossing low for Mitrovic to get across his man and finish low across goal and into the bottom corner.
After 38 minutes Swansea were back in it as Joel Piroe threaded Paterson through and he finished smartly into the corner after beating Paolo Gazzaniga, but Mitrovic soon restored Fulham's two-goal lead on the stroke of half-time, in a similar vein to his second goal, but this time with his right foot from Denis Odoi's cross from the right.
That goal would, in truth, be the end of the action, as Fulham saw out a comfortable win in the second half.
Never a doubt about this one. There was obviously fortune about the first, but the finish was still clinical, and his second and third were brilliant. Doubts remain about his ability to make an impact in the Premier League, but in the Championship Mitrovic is lethal. It's 10 goals already for the season. With him in this form, they have a real chance of an immediate return to the top flight.
Fulham's Marco Silva: "For Mitro to score three goals means he had a very good night. But the way we put the ball for him to score was really good. No striker in the world can score if the team doesn't set it up for him and we played well for him to score. That is why he is here with us, that is why we renewed his contract and that is why he is playing every time because he is player that knows the competition really well.
"He's not just important because he can score. He is a key player in the way we like to play. And of course he can score in the box. Since the first day he has been happy. He is on the same page as the others. When the team wins he is happy like the others. When the team loses he is unhappy like the others. Like all of us he is working hard to be successful at the end of the season. I'm definitely happy with the result. I thought we were very good, especially in the first half."
Swansea's Russell Martin: "I'm really disappointed we lost but I find it hard to be disappointed with the performance. I'm really proud of the players. We went toe to toe with the best team in the division. We had some great moments, sometimes you have to accept when they are playing with really high quality and two of their goals were really high quality.
"And the guy finishes it off is deadly and one of the best strikers in the division, if not the best. But the first goal is tough to take. We work on trying to get out of the box and he is offside. It's a mistake. I loved our performance in the second half. We showed real courage. We had a massive chance but what we we lacked was that bit of confidence, that bit of swagger which is what they had. But we looked a really good team for long periods."
Fulham head to Coventry on Saturday for a lunchtime kick-off live on Sky Sports Football from 12pm (kick-off 12.30pm). Swansea visit Derby at 3pm.
