Sweden’s national football teams are doing historically bad. Yesterday it was confirmed that the Swedish women’s national football team will be on the sidelines from next summer’s Paris Olympics.
Unlike the men’s soccer side, the Olympic tournament in women’s soccer has been highly regarded since it has been played since the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. Unlike men’s tournaments, there are no line-up restrictions.
On the men’s side, the development of Olympic football has been plagued by disagreements between the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Football Association (FIFA). Fifa has not wanted to risk the Olympics becoming a competitor to the men’s World Cup.
After the 1988 Seoul Games, Fifa decreed that only players aged 23 and under are allowed to play in the men’s Olympic tournament. Players in the 2024 Summer Olympics must have been born on January 1, 2001 or later. Nowadays, each team is allowed to have no more than three overage players.
“Incredibly disappointing”
Sweden’s women’s qualification for next summer’s Olympic tournament in Paris was confirmed when the team lost 0–1 to Switzerland in the Nations League, which acts as an Olympic qualifier.
Apart from the host country France, only the two best teams from the European Olympic qualifiers, i.e. from the A level of the League of Nations, advance to the Olympics. Reigning world champions Spain have now secured the group win ahead of Sweden and a place in the Nations League top four final tournament to be played in February.
For the first time, Swedish women were left out of the global competition. Between 1996 and 2021, Sweden played in all Olympic tournaments, winning silver twice. In Tokyo 2021, Sweden lost the final badly to Canada on penalties. Also in 2016 in Rio, Sweden took the silver medals.
Sweden has played in the World Championships every time since 1991, winning bronze four times and silver once. Sweden missed out on the European Championships in 1991 and 1993, so now with the Olympic qualification disappointment, the streak of 23 prestigious tournaments will be broken.
– Sweden’s historic fiasco, condemned the Swedish newspaper Expressen.
Swedish midfielder Johanna Rytting Kaneryd stated that he was “damn angry”.
– An incredible disappointment, of course. This is not what we wanted. Now it feels empty, Rytting Kaneryd spilled for SVT.
Even in last summer’s World Cup, Sweden scored nine goals in the three matches of the first group and finally progressed to the World Cup bronze. Now in the Nations League, Sweden has achieved a goal difference of 5-5 in its five group matches against Spain, Italy and Switzerland.
At least the head coach Peter Gerhardsson found the reason for the fiasco through this.
– I’m disappointed that we can’t get the ball into the goal. We don’t score goals and football is about goals. We haven’t been skilled enough in that area, Gerhardsson told SVT.
Aftonbladet described Sweden’s Olympic qualification “nightmarish”. However, the head coach Gerhardsson was overjoyed. He reflected that the level of the women’s European and World Championships has increased and expanded enormously, which of course is true.
– Unfortunately, nothing has really been developed for the Olympics. It will likely be an U23 tournament, like the men’s side. Of course, we would have liked to participate next summer, but the Olympics as a football tournament are not of the same quality as the European Championship and the World Cup, Gerhardsson predicts the future of Olympic football.
Spain’s wondrous mix
Due to Sweden’s defeat, Spain secured its group victory even before its own meeting with Italy on Friday. It may have had an effect, but the reigning world champion messed up with the job. First, Spain lost 2–3.
To top it all off, Italy’s 1-1 equalizer came at the start of the second period when Spain had one player too few on the field. Spain made a double substitution at the break. Fence Bonmati and On Athenea del Castio remained in exchange. However, he only came to the field Lucia Garcia.
So, for a while, Spain played with one understrength due to their own fault. Spanish newspapers described the incident as “chaos” and “a monumental mess”.
– Huge mistake. I apologize. This kind of thing can’t happen at this level, wondered del Castillo, who was replaced In an interview with AS.
Spain head coach Montse Tome explained the mistake by the fact that Bonmati only announced at the very end of the break that he could not continue. Hence Esther Gonzalez didn’t have time to finish himself before the start of the second period.
Sweden must beat Spain in their last group game, or Italy can also advance past Sweden. Then Sweden would have to be eliminated from their place in the A-league. Finland has secured its promotion to the A-league with its group win in the B-league.
Sweden’s national teams in turmoil
Now Sweden is facing rejuvenation surgery, say experts from its western neighbor. Gerhardsson has trusted the experienced players, because they have led Sweden to the finals of prestigious competitions numerous times. For example Caroline Seger is 38 years old, Kosovare Asllani 34 and Linda Sembrant 36.
SVT expert Hanna Marklund stated, that it is no shame to miss the Olympic place from the group where the opponent was the world champion Spain. However, the expert was very worried about Sweden’s game performances in the autumn Nations League, and therefore now is the time for a change.
The next European Championship will be played in the summer of 2025, so there is time for change work. For example, Asllani, who won two World Cup bronze medals and two Olympic silver medals, could not yet say whether her national team career would continue.
– This is hard to understand. Now there is emptiness and great disappointment on the surface, Asllani stated after the defeat against Switzerland.
In Sweden, national team football is now generally in a rather low place. For example Aftonbladet asked before the Nations League matches from Asllan and from Sofia Jakobsson, has Swedish football fallen off the bandwagon. Asllani, in particular, was frankly shocked by the question and thought it was strange – after all, Sweden is at the top of the women’s Fifa ranking.
– I would like to ask a counter question. How come we are behind others? Jakobsson stated.
– The men’s national team is not successful now, but we are number one in the world. We are not behind, we are on top, Asllani continued.
The atmosphere, like the attitude of the media and fans, is also affected by the men’s poor results. When the men’s Fifa rankings were updated on November 30, Sweden fell to 26th place. It is Sweden’s lowest ranking since 2017, when the team started to climb from 45th place.
Finland is 59th, i.e. it rose three places, when Huuhkajat defeated Northern Ireland and San Marino in the EC qualifiers.
A concrete example of toddlerhood came when Sweden lost 0-3 to Azerbaijan ranked 120th in the European Championship qualifiers. After an embarrassing defeat, the star striker Dejan Kulusveski even hinted at compensating travel expenses for the Swedish supporters who bothered to attend.
Read more: Is this how deep the Swedish national football team has sunk? The star player hinted at reimbursing the expenses to the fans
Sweden’s men did not make it to the 2022 World Championships or next summer’s European Championships. In the previous Nations League, Sweden finished last in its group at the B level and was relegated to the C League. Finland continues in the B-league.
Piloted Sweden since 2016 Jan Andersson was allowed to leave, because his contract was not extended after the EC qualification disappointment. The new head coach will not be named until the “first quarter” of 2024. The fact that Sweden was not prepared for the change was made by a TV expert by Martin Åslund to rage at the Swedish Football Association.
– This reeks of a lack of professionalism, which really provoked me. We are stuck somewhere in the 1980s, Åslund raged on Fotbollsmorgon-in the program.