Geoff Cameron and Jonathan Walters came onto the pitch just after the hour mark, and both had a hand in the winner as Stoke City picked up all three points at the Britannia to send Swansea back home on five matches without a win.
Wilfried Bony slotted home a penalty to give the away side the lead on 34 minutes but Charlie Adam scored a penalty of his own and Jonathan Walters headed in the winner for the Potters.
The game began wide-open and Swansea should have scored twice in the opening 10 minutes, but both Gylfi Sigurdsson and Ki Sung-Yeung missed chances in acres of space.
As the first half continued, it was more of the same. Peter Crouch, Mame Biram Diouf and Sigurdsson both had chances as the first half-hour dragged on, but touches were poor and defenders continued to get in the way.
7 - No player has conceded more penalties since the start of the 2008/09 season than Ryan Shawcross in the Premier League. Clumsy.
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) October 19, 2014
[RELATED: Watch full match replay]
The game finally found a goal when sharp-eyed referee Michael Oliver spotted Ryan Shawcross drag down Wilfried Bony on a Swansea corner, and the official showed Shawcross a yellow card and pointed to the spot. Bony chipped home the penalty for a 1-0 away lead.
Things got chippy as the clock ticked towards halftime, and Diouf picked up a booking as well.
[RELATED: Latest Premier League standings]
Stoke would get a lift just before the break as Oliver pointed to the spot in their favor as well, although this could be a little more controversial. Victor Moses went down quite easily under a soft challenge from Angel Rangel, and earned the spot kick. Charlie Adam buried the penalty to equalize before halftime.
The halftime break came and went, and the most exciting thing to happen before the hour mark was a trio of substitutions from the two sides that saw American Geoff Cameron make his season debut in the Premier League.
[VIDEO: Premier League highlights, here]
Finally, a moment of excitement struck in the 66th minute as a header from Sigurdsson off the end line came back into the box for Ki, but the Korean’s shot was collected by Asmir Begovic just inches from crossing the line.
Cameron, on just 13 minutes, was key in Stoke’s next goal to take the lead. He lept in front of Angel Rangel’s pass into the middle of the pitch and begun a series of pinpoint Stoke passing. It came to substitute Oussama Assaidi on the left, and his cross found the head of Jonathan Walters who thundered a long-range header past Lukasz Fabianski.
[RELATED: Premier League stats]
Swansea poured forward as time ticked towards the 90, but only Bony’s blast wide in the second minute of stoppage time would be the closest they’d come. The loss for the visitors is their fifth match in a row without a win, meaning they have just two points from a possible fifteen among that stretch.
For Stoke, they buck a trend of three losses in four, and bring them up to the top half of the table with 11 points.
LINEUPS:
Stoke City: Begovic; Bardsley, Shawcross, Wilson, Pieters; Nzonzi, Adam, Diouf (Walters 61'), Ireland (Cameron 62'), Moses (Assaidi 73'); Crouch.
Goals: Adam (pen) 43', Walters 76'
Swansea City: Fabianski; Rangel, Fernandez, Williams, Taylor; Carroll (Gomis 65'), Ki, Sigurdsson, Dyer (Montero 65'); Routledge, Bony.
Goals: Bony (pen) 34'