Swansea City fans welcome home open top Premier League parade

IT was perhaps the biggest and best street party Swansea has ever seen.

With flags and banners flying, faces painted and team shirts proudly worn, tens of thousands of people filled the centre of the city to welcome home the victorious Swans squad.

Swansea City had left for Wembley a Championship team, but were returning as the first Welsh club ever to make it to the Premier League.

While fans young and old saluted their team on the ground, high above a news helicopter hovered — perhaps a foretaste of the kind of coverage the city can expect now its football team has joined the world's most high profile football league.

The open-top bus parade with the heroes of Wembley could only have started in one place — the Vetch, home of so many memories for the club.

Trophy

From there the two red buses — led by a police car decked with Swans bunting and with an inflatable trophy tied to the roof — inched their way along West Way and down St Helen's Road towards the Guildhall.

As they made their stately procession along the route the great mass of black and white parted before them, while other fans climbed scaffolding and lampposts along the street to get a better view of the winning team.

Many of the fans were veterans of Monday's trip to Wembley which saw the club seal its place in the Premier League — but many thousands more who could not make the trip to the capital also filled the streets to join in the party.

Among the crowd was Dylan Edwards, from Blaenymaes, Swansea.

The 30-year-old was with one of the youngest fans on the route — his 10-month-old son Alfie, who even managed a little clap as the team buses approached.

Mr Edwards said: "The club is part of the community and I wanted to come along and see the team coming home.

"Getting in to the Premier League is fantastic for the whole area and the parade shows what it means to the people."

Happy

Inch-by-inch the buses made their way along St Helen's Road, with thousands of fans following in their wake, adding to the vast numbers waiting at the Guildhall to make a sea of happy supporters.

A banner hanging at the Swansea end of Wembley Stadium on Monday had simply read: "I just can't get enough" — and for the Jack Army the party has only just begun.

jason.evans@swwmedia.co.uk

Source: http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/32715/f/503366/s/158d0262/l/0L0Sthisissouthwales0O0Cnews0Cs0EPremier0Eparty0Etime0Efans0Ethrong0Estreets0Carticle0E36153510Edetail0Carticle0Bhtml/story01.htm

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