One last entry for now. If you click here, photo 4 is of Sjögran wistfully wishing it was still the 80s, nr 5 is Hanna Marklund after a creative burst of fashion activity heavily featuring tin foil, nr 7 is Frida Östberg and a future national team defender that will make the likes of Nilla Fischer look positively puny (= mother Frida Östberg, dad a former ice hockey player).
Actually, it seems plenty Sjögran-related happened behind the secenes. After the criticism last year of both the FA and the TV channel's handling of Sjögran's record-breaking caps, TV4 had prepared a video to celebrate her 200th cap... but skipped it because Mellberg and some past-it male musicians spent too much time talking. The fact that they're not even embarrassed to be so consistent in their penis-prioritising is gobsmacking. May they all die in a sea of flames.
Oh, they did show it, making a joke about Marta competing with Sundhage. That's their idea of covering women's football.
In Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet, Rosengård's sports manager, Erling Nilsson, says he's sorry Rosengård didn't boycott the gala because the women were treated with no respect whatsoever: "We're talking pure humiliation!" He of course mentions Sjögran's cancelled tribute, but also gives an interesting example of how the national teams were treated. The women's national team was told to show up two hours in advance... while the men's national team made a grand entry just before the gala started, accompanied by the Star Wars theme. Erling Nilsson says: "They can stop talking about equality. It's better if they say that they think women's football is too bad and not worth treating equally. The women have qualified for the World Cup and the men haven't qualified for anything."
Good to know these things; thanks for clarifications and additional info. (I did catch the Marta-with-guitar thing, but it was too short to count as entertainment). Really, all things told, this may have been the worst one yet. Well, I suppose I should go have a look at the pics you linked to first.
And do you agree with the numbers of wasps awarded by the paper's fashion editor? (I'm presuming the more wasps the better.) Sjögran with 4, Marklund and Östberg with 5. I am hesitant on Östberg. I'm not sure about the black-and-white flowers pattern, at least not in such profusion, and she appears to be wearing a ring made of down fluff on her right hand. You're right though, that that is an enormous-looking baby. (I highly recommend people to click on the "dad" link above, and remember that Östberg is not exactly tiny.) Marklund looks as if she's dressed up like a yule ornament, but I suppose that's not so strange. Sjögran... sigh. She looks tired.
Sometimes, a girl has to take fashion risks like that. Marta has come along way. Her stylists did a great job with this look. How do you say: "well done" in Swedish?
A storm of criticism published yesterday about Fotbollsgalan, listed here at dagensdamallsvenskan. Not showing the Sjögran tribute was apparently TV4's responsibility, and the Federation is talking about re-negotiating with some other channel, though I won't hold my breath for that. Rosengård is sorry they didn't just boycott the whole damn thing. "I think it was damn tough, to put it in reindeer Swedish," said Pia Sundage. (Nah, not really; even GiggleTranslate get "på ren svenska" right.) Here's my favorite new idiom for the day: att trampa i klaveret, which is literally to step on the piano, or in other words to step in it. And TV4 stepped on so many clefs that we didn't even know there were so many clefs. Even a wide-open goal can be missed, writes one of the journos I like, who also uses the piano metaphor. Update in edit: TV4 is now saying that leaving out the Sjögran tribute was all their fault; earlier they had blamed the FA. Did they jump, were they pushed, or are they taking the fall for Someone Else? Hmm. Zlatan says, "What's the fuss -- so, like, everyone should get a prize?" In a 'we expected no less of you' sort of way, or in a 'golly, that must have taken hours' sort of way?
Just in case we aren't mad enough a Fotbollsgalan... A little birdie has reminded me of a retirement in 2014 that went totally unremarked upon: that of Josefin Öqvist. As the little birdie asked, how many players for any Swedish national football team can say that they scored the goal that put Sweden into a World Cup final? Not many, and Öqvist is one of them. Did she get mentioned once? Not that I heard (which admittedly isn't worth much). Seems like her career would have been worth a nod or two.
Supercup, Supercup, sup-sup-Supercup... (pitting last season's #1 vs last season's #2) Dandal has put up a short highlights video and it looks like it was a good 'un (for people whose cable didn't crap out). Please watch this video for your yearly Spring-time reminder that Marta – seen here scoring the goal by slow-and-scary dribbling past 5 defending field players and then shooting out of reach of the otherwise well-placed goalkeeper – is really really good.