Swansea City’s miserable season continued as Brighton & Hove Albion claimed a 1-0 win over the Welsh side at the Liberty Stadium.

Brighton took the lead through Glenn Murray, who sneaked in at the back post as Federico Fernandez ducked under the cross before the striker bundled the ball home.

This is the fifth game Swansea have lost out of their last six, as pressure will surely start to mount on the players and staff that now sit in the relegation places.

Slow start

The first chance came for Swansea, as Leroy Fer found Kyle Naughton on the right flank, the full back played a cross in but a good interception by Shane Duffy was all that stopped Tammy Abraham from tapping the ball home.

Both sides looked neat in possession early on, but lacked that cutting edge, illustrated by two very over-hit crosses by Ki Sung-Yueng and Fer in quick succession.

That would surprise few though, as Swansea have registered just 20 shots on target in their opening 10 Premier League games. Only three sides have recorded lower totals at this stage since 2006: Sunderland in 2012, Aston Villa in 2014 and Burnley in 2016.

Murray capitalises on error

It was Murray who then gave Brighton the lead, sneaking in at the back post to bundle the ball past Lukasz Fabianski.

The goal came from Fernandez’s error, after the Argentine ducked under Anthony Knockaert’s cross only to realise Murray was right behind him to tap in.

It was a horror few minutes for Fernandez, who only two minutes earlier was booked for a reckless challenge on the Brighton goalscorer.

The goal was Murray’s 15th in his Premier League career, with 11 of those coming away from home.

Swansea had several free-kicks in dangerous areas, but poor delivery on each of them meant they couldn’t capitalise on something that resulted in so many goals last season.

Not scoring from set-pieces can be okay, but considering Swansea really struggle to create chances from open play, not taking advantage of dead balls does extra harm to the Welsh side.

Different half same story

Swansea still struggled to fashion chances, but Brighton did sit deeper and allowed the home side more possession.

Abraham’s first chance of the afternoon nearly equalised the scoreline, after Nathan Dyer squeezed the ball through to him but the recent England call-up couldn’t finish past Matt Ryan.

From the resulting corner, Fer and Abraham tried to stab the ball past Ryan but there were enough Brighton bodies between the ball and the goal for Swansea not to draw level.

Swansea were brighter in the second half, but the same problems were still there. Luciano Narsingh was brought on for Tom Carroll as Clement opted to move Ayew up front with Abraham.

It didn’t help though that until the change, probably Swansea’s most creative player in Ki, was playing as the deepest midfielder.

However Paul Clement isn’t the root of Swansea’s problems, poor recruitment is. Fans will bemoan some of his decisions, and rightly so, but there are few managers on the planet that would do well with this squad.

Swansea go in search of an equaliser

With 25 minutes left, Brighton had to sit deeper as Swansea amped up the pressure. However Duffy and Lewis Dunk are experts at defending in a low block, and it played right into their hands.

Brighton had a chance to double the lead, countering from a Swansea free kick but Solly March couldn’t get on the end of a through ball, which rolled to a grateful Fabianski.

Swansea took Clucas off for Wayne Routledge, moved Naughton to left-back and Routledge went to right-back, which was an odd tactical tweak in order to try and grab a goal.

Frustration built up at the Liberty Stadium, as several fans headed to the exits early and Clucas even booted a water bottle in anger as he was subbed off.

That frustration remained in the air, as Swansea still struggled to create anything noteworthy against a Brighton side that barely gave any effort in the second half.

However Narsingh did have an effort rattle the crossbar in stoppage time after Abraham found him well in front of goal. Swansea didn’t deserve that to go in, but they definitely needed it to.

Swansea have now lost two Premier League home games against newly-promoted sides in the same season for the first time.

While Brighton win back-to-back away games in the top flight for only the second time in their history. They beat Crystal Palace and Sunderland in April 1981.

The result sees Swansea move into the relegation places, and Everton could still leapfrog them tomorrow.