USWNT set for up to date explosive World Cup conflict with Sweden

To paraphrase these Swedish poet laureates ABBA: Mamma mia, right here we go once more.

The USA and Sweden are set to resume top-of-the-line rivalries in ladies’s soccer on Sunday morning in an sudden Spherical of 16 showdown on the World Cup in Melbourne, Australia.

The U.S. Ladies’s Nationwide Staff emerged from group play as Group E’s wobbly runners-up.

Their perch atop the game appeared as perilous as ever, head coach Vlatko Andonovski appeared ailing outfitted for the job and retired workforce nice Carli Lloyd took potshots at the players for poor performances and, uh, signing autographs. Sweden, in the meantime, eased to first place in Group G.

The 2 world powers shall be assembly for the sixth consecutive World Cup, and so they additionally clashed on the previous two Olympics — with explosive outcomes.

“We all the time play Sweden in each main event,” U.S. ahead Alex Morgan mentioned this week. “In all probability each time since I’ve been on this workforce. So, we all know them very properly. We all know their strengths.”

What makes Sweden such a frequent and decided nemesis for the USWNT? Let’s have a look:

The historical past

The USA largely has gotten the higher of Sweden of their earlier World Cup clashes.

There have been group-stage wins in 1991, 2003, 2007 and 2019 (when Sweden appeared none too upset to be relegated to what was perceived because the weaker half of the knockout bracket — perhaps there’s a lesson in that), a scoreless attract 2015 and a Sweden group-stage win in 2011 (the USWNT recovered to succeed in the ultimate).

Reasonably, it’s Sweden’s wins prior to now two Olympic tournaments that present the concerns for American followers.

In 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Sweden, led by former USWNT coach Pia Sundhage, bunkered in and eradicated the Individuals within the quarterfinals on penalty kicks after a 1-1 draw, prompting an notorious outburst from goalkeeper Hope Solo.

“We misplaced to a bunch of cowards,” Solo mentioned. “The higher workforce didn’t win.

“They didn’t need to open play. They didn’t need to cross the ball. They didn’t need to play nice soccer.”

Within the opening match of the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, Sweden blitzed the U.S., 3-0, ending their 44-match unbeaten streak.

“It’s irritating, and it’s irritating that it’s Sweden,” U.S. ahead Megan Rapinoe mentioned on the time. “They discovered a variety of area on us.”

The Individuals by no means appeared fairly proper for the rest of the event, stumbling their technique to a bronze medal.

Sweden’s strengths

Sweden, coming into the 2023 World Cup, was anticipated to have top-of-the-line defenses within the area.

It lived as much as that status in successful all three of its group-stage matches, culminating in a 2-0 victory Wednesday over Argentina in Hamilton, New Zealand, with a number of regular starters resting on the bench.

The Swedes scored a mixed 9 objectives and conceded only one within the group stage.

Anticipated objectives statistics — metrics designed to measure the likelihood of a shot leading to a objective — portrayed a much less favorable image: Sweden posted a cumulative 7.7 anticipated objectives (xG) and a pair of.4 anticipated objectives towards (xGA).

(Those self same numbers for the sky-is-falling USWNT? 7.8 and 0.7. Hmm.)

Sweden relied closely on set items within the opening spherical, scoring 4 of its objectives off of nook kicks, together with three near-identical headers by 5-foot-10 middle again Amanda Ilestedt.

Sweden tends to function out of a standard 4-2-3-1 formation.

The damaging Stina Blackstenius, who performs her membership soccer at Arsenal, options at middle ahead.

She had two objectives in Sweden’s rout of the USWNT in Tokyo.

Kosovare Asllani orchestrates the assault out of an attacking midfield position.

Fridolina Rolfo, who performed final season with a juggernaut Barcelona workforce, scored two objectives within the group stage from the winger place.

Sofia Jakobsson, who probably will come off the bench, performs within the NWSL for the San Diego Wave and is a teammate of each Morgan and American middle again Naomi Girma.

There’s loads of familiarity between these two groups. The query is: Will that end in the US’ premature demise or will it present the inspiration they should get a foothold on this World Cup?