By David Williams
Luke Williams believes Swansea City’s previously shot-shy strikers can build on the club’s first goals for over nine hours.
After failing to find the net throughout October, the Swans eventually ended their barren run when Zan Vipotnik turned in Ronald’s cross to spark a 2-1 victory at Oxford United at the weekend.
Swans substitute Florian Bianchini sealed victory in the 80th minute when he ran on to Goncalo Franco’s pass and finished neatly from 16 yards.
Dane Scarlett halved the deficit for Oxford with a low drive two minutes from time but it was not enough.
Excited to see the reunion at 12.30
Oxford United v Swansea City
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Vipotnik had only scored one previous goal for the club since joining in the summer, whilst Bianchini had not managed to find the scoresheet in five substitute appearances and one start.
“I don’t think there is anything better for your confidence than scoring a goal to help your team win,” said Swans head coach Williams.
“The first goal from Vipi is a proper goalscorer’s goal, he has got a tap in from making sure he is in the right place at the right time.
“Ronald has stayed calm and put the ball across for him and he has put it over the line.
“The second one is a one v one, and in those situations you have to be able to hold your nerve, and Florian struck the ball really cleanly.
“We are very, very pleased with that.”
Swansea City “Edge” Forward As Luke Williams Looks To Carry The Fight
The victory has lifted Swansea up to 12th in the table, five points adrift of the play-off places with 33 games of the season left to play.
It was their first win since September 21 and followed six matches in which they failed to gain a victory and scored just one goal.
“There’s some relief but I think we deserved to win today and that’s important for me,” added Williams.
“Oxford threw absolutely everything at us and we could have dealt with that a bit better but I still think we were value for the victory.
“I think we played football how we wanted to play football from the beginning.
“I’d tried to convince the players that if we kept playing as we want to play then goals would come.
“It’s probably our best away performance over 90 minutes. I think we have performed at a similar level at home but today we were more clinical in front of goal.
“We should take confidence from being the first team to win at Oxford this season because I can see why they had that record.”
The result was Oxford’s first home defeat of the season and they have now gone eight Championship matches without a win.
Manager Des Buckingham said: “I didn’t think we were very good at all, for large parts of the game.
“Yet despite being poor, we have still created three very good chances before Dane scored his at the end.
“That’s the most disappointing thing because we are so much better than what we have just shown.
“We need to start the game a hell of a lot better than we did, and make sure that we believe we are good enough to perform at this level – that’s what I want to see and we will need to see on Tuesday.
“We have had a really good six to eight months. We knew this season was going to be a challenge, we need to be sure that when we hit these challenges we are clear on what we need to do and how we do it.”
