Game to celebrate 100 years of swedish football. Obviously the result wasn't much of a party for the Swedes. Sweden - Norway 0-4 (0-1) 0-1 (45. min) Marit Fiane Christensen, 0-2 (47. min) Trine Rønning, 0-3 (56. min) Christensen, 0-4 (77. min) Rønning. Sweden: Hedvig Lindahl (Caroline Jönsson 46') - Frida Östberg, Karolina Westberg, Jane Törnqvist, Kristin Bengtsson - Therese Sjögran, Malin Moström (Frida Nordin 84'), Anna Sjöström (Linda Fagerström 65') - Josefine Öqvist (Hanna Ljungberg 46'), Victoria Svensson (Lotta Schelin 75'), Salina Olsson (Malin Andersson 46') Norway: Bente Nordby - Gunhild Følstad - Ane Stangeland - Marit Fiane Christensen - Ann Iren Mørkved (Siri Nordby 45.) - Kristine Edner - (Tonje Hansen 76.) - Ingvild Stensland - Unni Lehn - Solveig Gulbrandsen (Siv Skard 86.) – Heidi Pedersen (Ragnhild Gulbrandsen 45.) – Trine Rønning (Anne Tønnesen 92.) Attendance: 7.096 Ref: Paula Thörn, Lagan.
Swedish press, both Expressen and Aftonbladet have hade massive coverage of this disaster and they all agree that serious efforts have to be made in terms of set plays where Sweden have to improve in a major way. In other ways things are looking up, the defenders are coming back from injuries and Hanna and Victoria will hopefully manage to get their game in gear. Media talk of scrubbing the 4-3-3 system, but most importantly experts and media alike request more physical play in the box. Both in defense and in the last third Sweden needs to play less fair and gentle.
Indeed, at the first three goals the defense didn't look good on the set pieces. And the fourth goal. I would say that shot goes in 1 time out of 100 but as it did, it sure looked good. Mistake in the first post: Fourth goal for Norway at 69th minute.
Well, it's always nice to win, especially against Sweden, but it isn’t that hard to win when the opponents play at 75% of their capacity. It seemed as if most of the Swedish players were focused on one thing: avoiding injuries. Since the Olympic team has already been nominated, only an injury will keep them from going to the Olympics. What worries me is that the coach Åge Steen and some of the players seem to think that we are as good as the result says. I hope that they will snap out of this illusion or else we will have problems qualifying for the European Championships. The last time we played against a motivated team (Denmark) we lost and now we will end up second in our qualifying group which means that we have to play an extra qualification game. Sweden actually made seven substitutions, the ones mentioned above and Sofia Eriksson for Kristin Bengtsson (42'). According to the new FIFA rules only six substitutions are allowed in friendlies, but maybe this game wasn’t an official friendly?
It also shows that Sweden has a very thin side, unless the top four defenders are fit to play, the entire team becomes utterly useless. Since there are no good reserve defenders, Frida Östberg has to be moved back from midfield, thus weakening both back-end and midfield. The defenders were useless on set plays and the midfield was not agressive enough
First of all, "Gratulerer" to Bente Nordby and Co. on their very impressive victory against those much hated Swedes. If this current Swedish team was not motivated enough playing against their archrival Norway in a match commemorating 100 years of Swedish football then perhaps they don't really belong in this year's Olympics. For the record, the last time the Swedish women actually managed to defeat Norway was before Norway won the 1995 World Cup on Swedish soil. Since Norway was the defending Olympic Champions, for the Swedes to qualify for this year's Olympics instead of Norway, at the very least their should have been a home and away playoff to determine the final UEFA spot.
Actually I'm really not wondering about the superior victory of Norge... couple of days ago they just had a quite actual match against Germany... and that's also my question-concern. Can anybody tell me, why Bente Nordby didn't play against Germany? Ingrid Hjelmseth was goalkeeper against the Germans (and btw she did a real good job)... but I'm wondering, why Bente didn't play, because she was with the team in Hoffenheim/GER... Hope anybody can answer my question... Nordby1? Greetz, nadine
If Marika Domanski-Lyfors had waited with the Olympic nominations until after the friendly they would have had something to play for. But the facts are: - The Olympic team was already nominated - Two of the nominated players have had to pull out because of injuries - They know that we always play a physical game I don't think it's that strange that they were a little cautious, I know I would be. And Heidi Pedersen breaking Kristin Bengtsson's nose in the 4th minute didn't really help the situation. You don't seem to follow Norwegian women's football very closely. If you did you would know that we were defeated by Sweden in September 2000 (before the Olympics). For technical reasons this was not an official friendly so it doesn't show up in the statistics, but you can read about it here. I agree that the qualification process was incorrect, but that doesn't change the fact that Norwegian women's football is in decline and that both Germany and Sweden have better teams at the moment. Unfortunately the result from this friendly will probably mean that it's business as usual, instead of doing something about the problems.
Because Åge Steen finally realised that you have to give the younger players a chance to play against good teams.
Just to set things straight: Norway didn't qualify for Athens because they allowed themself to be humiliated by Brasil in the group play. If they had won that game, they would have faced Sweden in the quarters, not USA. One good (and sometimes appearently troublesome) thing about football is that you always have your destiny in your own hands. Win your matches and there will be nothing to complain about.
Of course I was referring only to matches between Norway and Sweden that have been included in official statistics, but "tusen takk" just the same for going to all of that effort to post the link to an Aftenposten article about some obscure pre-Olympic training match that even most of the players have forgotten about. Even though they lost badly to Brazil in the World Cup I still believe that Norway, which is ranked third in FIFA's most recent rankings, really did deserve a chance to defend their Olympic Championship and that Greece still only ranked 53rd shouldn't be take Norway's place just because it is the host nation. IMO it doesn't make much sense to include the host nation in an event where it has a much greater chance of completely getting embarrassed than it does of actually competing for a medal.
One reaction in Sweden has actually been "Norway unexpectedly lost to Sweden before the Sydney olympics and went on to win gold", so naturally the 2000 game is a fond memory. Ranking changes very slowly. You have to suck pretty bad to get a noticeable change in rank. I'm sure even if Norway lost every international game they play for the next ten years (which will never happen, of course, but please bear with me here) they would still be ranked as being within the top 7 or 8 national teams. Not knowing you are past your prime is easy. We didn't realize that we had lost our 1984 excellence until like... 1999/2000? At that time of course things had even started to look up with Hanna Ljungberg and Victoria Svensson, but still: that's how late we realized....
I completely agree. Giving the host nation this free ticket is completely what the Olympics should NOT! be about. Getting an Olympic medal should mean you have beaten the best in the world, not the best plus some charity matches. Norway is out of the Olys not because they "allowed themselves to be humiliated", but because of the stupid Olympic rules that narrowed the field to only 2 Euro nations, and again, as well as giving a free pass to Greece. Can you imagine if someone like Serena Williams, etc. was not allowed to play Wimbledon because she lost at the French Open, but some unknown British player ranked 200 was "placed" in the main draw because of host nation status?
Gratulerer Med Dagen Bente!! First of all, "danke" for posting this awesome picture of Bente. I was tempted to say that Coach Steen had given Bente some time off to celebrate her 30th birthday , but since she was actually with the team in Germany and not partying back in Oslo, I agree with Parker that Steen was probably just letting a younger player get some much needed PT with the Norwegian NT.
The hosts have been automatically qualified in football championships for a very long time and I don't think that will change anytime soon. FIFA wanted to include 12 teams in the Olympics so Norway could have made it to the Olympics as a 4th European team, but the IOC decided to only allow 10 teams. The reason was "too many athletes"... For the same reason each team is only allowed to have 18 players. Even so, FIFA could have decided to have 12 teams, if they reduced the number of men's teams from 16 to 12, but the old farts at FIFA would never consider doing that...
Re: Gratulerer Med Dagen Bente!! Ah yeah, birthday could have been a reason, but wouldn't be very professional, um? Well so - cool 2 see, that your coach gives Ingrid Hjelmseth a chance, to get a match against the world-champion I guess, she had a lot of fun, especially while listening to the little norwegian crowd right behind her goal Btw - you can see some more pix of that match here: Pix Germany - Norway, 21.7.04
SV: Gratulerer Med Dagen Bente!! I wonder if Bente will manage to do anything this year to top the way she was able to celebrate her 30th birthday last year with a clean sheet against Sweden in Uddevalla three days after Norway had defeated top ranked Germany in Hoffenheim.
SV: Gratulerer Med Dagen Bente!! According to an article posted at the Asker FK website, Bente was just planning to have a nice quiet birthday enjoying a beautiful summer day out on an island with her mother, father, and her dog Diaz. Birthday Chat: Bente Nordby (31)