Sofiemyr Experience I really appreciate everything that the Kolbotn staff did to help me have such a positive experience. I arrived at Sofiemyr approximately 90 minutes before the kickoff and was warmly welcomed by Solveig Gulbrandsen's mother who I had met at Sofiemyr during my previous trip to Kolbotn a year ago last June. Not only was I given an all access guest pass for myself and a friend who was arriving later, I was also invited to eat lunch with the Scandinavian journalists and have all of the hot coffee and waffles I wanted. Most of the Norwegian Fotball Federation officials were in in the VIP area prior to the match along with the Norwegian Women's National Team Coach Bjarne Berntsen. Berntsen remembered me from last year's Euro2005 training camp and gave me his business card and said he would gladly do an interview with me prior to next year's World Cup. One of Kolbotn's most famous fans, former Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik was in attendence for the match and so was Hege Riise and several of her Team Strømmen teammates. As it turned out, by chance I ended up sitting in the same row as Hege and had a nice chance to talk with her after the first half. After the match I was invited up into the press room where I was able to ask Hanna Ljungberg and Lise Klaveness several questions. After the press conference ended, Kolbotn coach Aksel Bergo was nice enough to stay around a few minutes longer and talk to me as well. I did a report for the San Diego based "Inside Soccer" radio show Saturday night and if I have time later today I will post the link. "Skål!"
Re: Stensland going to Umeå? The article says that Lise Klaveness is happy with her year in Umeå, in terms of the level of soccer she gets to play, but she misses the things around soccer and just playing soccer is extremely boring, she says. Klaveness is 50/50 in favor of staying but that was assuming Umeå were able to help her with a trainee position so she can finish her university degree. Of course, having Stensland, her best friend playing for the same team would be a lot of fun. I've missed that, she says.
"Inside Soccer" Link "Tusen takk" for the translation help. Here is the link to the UEFA Cup semifinal report we did on "Inside Soccer" this past Saturday: http://www.worldtalkradio.com/archive.asp?aid=8329 (Click on segment 1)
Ludlow: We're Favorites to Reach Final http://www.arsenal.com/article.asp?thisNav=ladies&article=427079&cpid=703&title=Ludlow+-+We%27re+favourites+to+reach+Final
Arsenal - Bröndby 3-0 Sorry don't have any more news on the match, SVT text just had the result. Arsenal is in Final for the first time, the sixth team to reach it ever
Ok,now UEFA have it: http://www.uefa.com/competitions/WomenCup/FixturesResults/Round=2349/match=85105/Report=RP.html
Is it normal for the final to be played five months after the semifinals? Isn't that a little far between?
Normally the Semi-finals are played in March, but now, just to ******** some more with the Nordic teams, they decided to put the semi-finals on dates when football pitches in Scandinavia are mostly covered with snow and ice.
Umeå IK vs Kolbotn IL 6-0 (2-0) Kolbotn kept their flat back four high and gave square miles of open space for Marta and Ljungberg and Moström. Kolbotn made changes in the 2nd half but failed to control Moström and Umeå picked up the rebounds throughout. The SVT commentator was talking about "meeting Arsenal at Emirates stadium", but of course they must be playing at Borehamwood... Still, lots of praise of Umeå, and heavy criticism of Kolbotn tactics, but perhaps Umeå is just very much better. Anne Makinen was interviewed after the game and looked like somebody just died. Possibly it is because she's thinking of leaving and will thus miss the finals. Bad move, if you ask me, but OK, she wants a life after football and feels like she has to start thinking about that.
No, Arsenal Ladies is actually playing their home leg of the final at Emirates stadium, or at least their manager is claming that. http://www.uefa.com/competitions/WomenCup/FixturesResults/Round=2349/match=85105/Report=RW.html
Thanks for the prompt updates, for those of us who don't get TV2. Really, it is surprising that Kolbotn couldn't put up more of a fight, especially after that first semifinal. As far as playing their home leg at Emirates, good for the publicity, I suppose, but how will the home fans react when Arsenal gets crushed? Let's hope they react like everyone else does, by trying to buy Marta.
So far in the Finals, the six seasson (including this) it have run: Clubs: 4 times: Umeå (SWE) 3 time: Frankfurt (GER) 2 times: Postdam (GER) Once: Djurgården\Älvsjö (SWE), Fortuna Hjorring (DEN) and Arsenal (ENG) Countries: 5 times: Sweden and Germany once: Denmark and England
Yes, I just noticed that on UEFA myself... (Memo to Self: Read first, post later) Oh, and Jan, kudos on those Uppsala defenders. Johanna Frisk played a great game!
Goals from the Umeå vs Kolbotn match: http://svt.se/svt/road/Classic/shared/mediacenter/player.jsp?d=21995&a=699231
Thanks for that too-- very nice looking goals, all of them. Any word on the condition of the pitch-- that is, does Uefa have any cause for complaint about the artificial surface? From the video it seems like there was more snow than there had been in Oslo last week, but everybody's footing looked fine.
I guess the ball rolls a bit faster, but nobody seemed to mind. Kolbotn seemed more at home on Gammliavallen than at Sofiemyr.
Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet interviews a few Arsenal players about Emirates stadion, their semi final and the upcoming final. http://www.aftonbladet.se/atv/player.html?catID=26&clipID=12720
I think the difference between Sofiemyr in Norway last week and Umeå's Gammliavallen this week wasn't so much the artificial turf as the underground heating in Umeå.
Arsenal-Brondby 2nd leg [R] From the Arsenal site: Game account http://www.arsenal.com/matchreport.asp?thisNav=fixtures&fxid=309261&clid=4433&cpid=827 Akers - "It's a proud moment for all of us" http://www.arsenal.com/article.asp?thisNav=ladies&article=428559&lid=&Title=Vic+Akers:+%27It%27s+a+proud+moment+for+us%27
Classy Umea seal Arsenal datehttp://www.uefa.com/competitions/WomenCup/FixturesResults/Round=2349/match=85103/Report=RP.html Akers aims for another landmark http://www.uefa.com/competitions/WomenCup/news/Kind=1/newsId=478250.html
A tad off subject-- it's not easy to find information about European teams (except on this site), other than Germany and Sweden. Does anyone know of good sites that have national team information, stats, profiles and match reports for ANY of these: Norway Finland Denmark Holland France thanks.
Vrouwenvoetbal NL for news about Dutch women's soccer (in Dutch). Foot Féminin for news about women's soccer in France (in French).