Swansea City have defeated Aston Villa 1-0 at the Liberty Stadium to climb 11 points clear of the Premier League relegation zone.
A poor and flat contest in South Wales was decided by Federico Fernandez's goal early in the second half, leaving a slightly improved Villa side rooted well adrift at the foot of the table.
The Swans' third win in four will now likely be enough to ensure another campaign of top-flight football, but they will have to improve on this showing if they are to officially confirm survival in the coming weeks.
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The visitors produced arguably their best first-half display of the season, without truly being able to trouble Lukasz Fabianski in the Swansea goals.
Nine minutes had passed before the first shot arrived - a slack piece of Jack Cork play being capitalised on by Jordan Ayew, who could only blast over with a man in support.
A big talking point arrived midway through the half when Ashley Williams, unhappy with being grappled to the ground by Rudy Gestede, shoved his opponent's face with his hand to receive just a telling-off from Mike Dean.
Villa were still very much the team on top, however, and they had another good opening to make a breakthrough when Ciaran Clark headed over unmarked from a corner 25 minutes in.
Just when Swansea finally appeared to be growing in confidence a little, a cross from the right was well met by Gestede to force Fabianski into a save - the only time either keeper was called into action all half.
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Gestede and Clark both came close once more in the dying embers of an opening 45 minutes largely dominated by the basement boys, only for their respective attempts to fall short of the target.
City boss Francesco Guidolin, back on the sidelines after a three-match absence with a chest infection, brought on Leon Britton for Ki Sung-yueng at the interval but the hosts still remained unbalanced.
Despite being far from their best, Swansea were ahead less than 10 minutes into the second half when Fernandez bundled home his first goal for the club.
A free kick into the box, coming after the already-booked Aly Cissokho had pulled back on Modou Barrow, was not met by Guzan to allow Fernandez - who knew little about it - to bundle the ball home from the Swans' first on-target attempt.
Swansea, who can now hold claim to back-to-back home wins for the first time since August, struggled to truly build on their opener in a quiet end to the match.
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Joleon Lescott's flicked header was easily handled by Fabianski in the final 15 minutes of the game, proving to be the closest either side came to adding to the scoreline.
Swansea had the simple task of seeing out the remainder of game with relative ease, making their end-of-season run-in now seem a little simpler to navigate.
Daniel Lewis
