Sweden 5-0 Iceland

National Day in Sweden was celebrated with an amusing Euro 2008 qualifier win over Iceland, certainly not a classic game for the brilliance of the football, but entertaining enough for Swedes.

Even if the game could hardly be expected to be played at the soaring pace of Saturday’s, the lads (in a similar line-up, but with Rosenberg replacing the suspended Elmander) started brightly enough and after having controlled most of the play took the lead after 9 minutes. An ambitious shot from midfield by Linderoth, who advanced unchallenged with an ocean of space around him, was blocked by Arason only to be picked up again by Sweden. Wilhelmsson fed the ball to Allbäck, who chipped it into goal. Iceland responded by putting ten men behind the ball and while Sweden retained much of the possession, they increasingly found it difficult to get anywhere. On 37 minutes Iceland decided to open up and push forward after all; mainly inspired by Spurs reserve Emil Hallfredson, who was one of Iceland’s better players until substituted. His great strike was cleared by Nilsson – Gunnarsson then tested Isaksson. Minutes later Sweden increased the lead, Svensson took a shot from a corner kick.

Iceland, unsettled, soon lapsed in concentration and let the Swedes grab a third before half-time. Lovely work from Wilhelmsson and Alexandersson (a great right wing partnership throughout) allowed the latter to lift a ball over the Iceland defence; it found Mellberg who coolly finished with a right-foot volley. It became the decisive goal, which set the Swedish mood to triumphant and daring and the Icelandic to tired and dejected. Sweden after the break were displaying a lot more creativity, taking chances and, it seemed, having fun. A few minutes into the second half, Rosenberg, just onside, got the ball and made a solo run followed by a nice but narrow finish: the ball hit the post and went into goal.

The final nail in the Icelandic coffin came on 50 minutes, when the Swedish players appealed for a handball penalty, were not given one and everybody seemed unsure what was going on. The referee, Alain Hamer, our old favourite from the first Sevilla game, added to his reputation in my book as strange by confusing absolutely everyone. An Icelandic player seemed to pass the ball back to the goalkeeper (in the belief that it had been deemed a goal kick?), it was intercepted by Rosenberg who played around with it and passed it to Allbäck. Allbäck in turn shot it into goal, the goalkeeper watching him do it as the ball was thought to be out of play. Or something. Everybody was flabbergasted to find that the goal counted. The ball had never been out of play at all.

And that was it, Iceland gave up and the rest of the game saw a lot of substitutions which reflected that the game, essentially, was over. Zlatan Ibrahimovic came on for the final 20 minutes or so, but despite the apparent delight of the crowd and the odd little move he failed to add any more gloss on the evening. The best creative moves still came from Alexandersson and Wilhelmsson and crowd and country at that point were just quite happy with anything that happened on the field. The three points had been in the bag for a while. On Friday UEFA awarded the win over Denmark as 3-0 and Sweden now sit happily at the top of group F, three points clear of Spain.

Sweden
Andreas Isaksson, Niclas Alexandersson, Olof Mellberg, Petter Hansson, Mikael Nilsson, Christian Wilhelmsson, Tobias Linderoth, Anders Svensson, Fredrik Ljungberg, Markus Rosenberg, Marcus Allbäck
Substitutes: Rami Shaaban, Max von Schlebrügge, Daniel Majstorovic, Daniel Andersson, Kennedy Bakircioglü, Zlatan Ibrahimović, Rade Prica
Goals: Allbäck (11), Svensson (42), Mellberg (45), Rosenberg (50), Allbäck (51)

Iceland
Árni Arason, Grétar Steinsson, Gunnar Thor Gunnarsson, Ólafur Örn Bjarnason, Ivar Ingimarsson, Theodor Bjarnason, Arnar Vidarsson, Emil Hallfredsson, Brynjar Gunnarsson, Hannes Sigurdsson, Birkir Saevarsson
Substitutes: Dadi Lárusson, Kristján Sigurdsson, Stefán Gíslason, Hjalmar Jonsson, Ragnar Sigurdsson, Matthias Gudmundsson, Veigar Páll Gunnarsson

Attendance: 33358
Referee: Alain Hamer (Luxemburg)

The Scandinavian derby drama

What a spectacular drama! And no, I’m not talking about the mess at the end – I’m talking about the game which preceded it…

For 88 minutes this was some of the most energetically entertaining and interesting football these two countries have managed for a long while, played at a pace which made even me, an observer fully aware how it would end, breathless. On the night I had made a guest appearance in my former job, standing behind the bar in a busy pub and thus reduced to watching the reaction of the Swedes around me rather than getting a chance to see anything on the screen. Sweden, it had been thought ahead of the game, was the underdog and the crowd went from happy to happier to euphoric – and then to subdued to nervous and finally erupted in excited disbelief. Throughout the remainder of the evening I was puzzled by small little acts of solidarity with our neighbours, like the man who came up with a sad face and said “I want a Danish beer”. He was given a Carlsberg and drank a toast. Yes, we really want to beat the Danes – but we want to do it by playing the better football.

The game kicked off and saw Denmark with a few near chances inside the first minutes as a pattern emerged – full pace football from end to end, Denmark with the quicker breaks and more elegant passing, Sweden with the harder pressure and sharper chance taking. As well as defensive slip-ups and heroics on both sides. Gravgaard’s feeble attempt at a defensive header fell to the feet of Johan Elmander who saw his chance, controlled the ball and took a clean and confident finish past Sörensen on six minutes. Dream start for Elmander, undoubtedly the best Swede on the field, who continued to pose a threat. By the time Sweden got a free kick, 21 minutes into the game, both goalkeepers had been forced into plenty of action and play had been distributed evenly on the entire pitch – still with the Swedes looking that bit sharper. Centre-half Petter Hansson took the free kick, from 34 metres, and cannoned a shot (which took a small deflection off Jacobsen) into goal. Manager Lagerbäck sported a priceless smile as he saw the defender score his first Sweden goal. There was nothing of the underdog left when, a few minutes later, Christian Wilhelmsson (also in truly impressive form) ran around Kristiansen and passed a ball to Elmander which the striker back-heeled past Sorensen. 3-0 and cruising, Wilhelmsson and Elmander looking like they could pull anything off.

Denmark continuously tried to explore Sweden’s weaker left side and were eventually rewarded – a Gravgaard pass landed in the middle and Daniel Agger took a shot straight through the legs of a host of Swedes. His shot took a deflection off the post and found the back of the net; Isaksson was chanceless. Denmark manager Olsen saw a chance to turn the game around and made the first of three key substitutions, which eventually turned the game somewhat – Kristiansen, unable to deal with Wilhelmsson, made way for Andreasen and Jacobsen moved to left-back. The game continued at full speed, even when Allbäck fell down injured; the Danes proceeded with their attack and aggression mounted as Elmander decided to break their stride with a tough tackle. His booking means he will be suspended for the next game. A few more chances for either side, most notably a shot from Ljungberg into the arms of Sörensen, concluded the final minutes of the first half.

The second half started exactly where the first had left off, and saw the introduction of rising star Nicklas Bendtner. Despite a bright opening and a good chance early on for the youngster, the next goal fell to skipper Tomasson, who took full advantage of the hole left in the Sweden defence when Mellberg slipped. The introduction of Gronkjaer allowed the Danes to push further up and put more strain on the already hard working Swedish midfielders, who needed, and received, defensive help from the strikers. Elmander continued to be everywhere at one until he was replaced by Rosenberg with 15 minutes to go. Finally, the Danes equalised, with a shot from Andreasen after a corner, and the final 10 minutes were all about Denmark – Isaksson had 5 saves to make. How anyone was still standing, let alone still running at full speed, at this stage is a mystery.

And so we reach the end, Rosenberg falls and remains down in the penalty area. The referees conferred and replays confirmed that he had been heavily punched in the stomach by Poulsen. Herbert Fandel had time to show a red card and point to the spot before receiving a blow himself – from a man who had run onto the pitch and was wrestled away by Gravgaard. The German referee immediately stopped the game, the players left, two more “supporters” came on – security was confirmed to be substandard and the game was abandoned. The Danish supporters stared in disbelief at the screen which read “Sweden win 0-3”.

A result which reflected the game as a whole would have been the 3-3 it looked to end with. A dramatic Swedish win could have been effected by the awarded penalty (Poulsen really should be thoroughly ashamed of himself) and put the game in the history books. But nobody wanted this great game to be abandoned because of bad security and bad breaches of said bad security. Just bad. UEFA have yet to confirm the outcome, of course, but it looks set to be awarding the win to Sweden. And I will just remember this game for the 88 minutes of marvellously entertaining football – skill, speed, tactical manoeuvring, passion and glorious mistakes.

Denmark
Sörensen, Jacobsen, Gravgaard, Agger, Kristiansen (Andreasen 35), Rommedahl, Jensen (Grönkjaer 62), Kahlenberg (Bendtner 46), Poulsen, Jörgensen, Tomasson.
Goals: Agger, 33; Tomasson 61; Andreasen 75

Sweden
Isaksson, Alexandersson, Mellberg, Hansson, Nilsson, Wilhelmsson, Linderoth, Svensson, Ljungberg, Allbäck (Bakircioglü 80), Elmander (Rosenberg 74).
Goals: Elmander, 6, Hansson 21, Elmander 26.

Attendance: 42083
Referee: Herbert Fandel