Tuesdays with Damallsvenskan 3

LdB FC Malmö v Linköpings FC, Damallsvenskan Round 4
3 maj 2011

Spring started quite nicely in Sweden this year. April had many days of sunshine, the flowers are up, the people are out and about... then May arrived, and now we are getting our aprilväder, for sure. The official game report at damfotboll actually mentions the weather conditions more than once, while another reliable witness swears that the precipitation turned to snow and it was "too cold to Tweet." Now that's cold. Cultural note: Swedes do not lightly complain about the weather. If a Swede says it's bad, it's bad, trust me.

And it looked bad, and it even sounded bad. You can see the precipitation coming down, and the artificial surface is shiny and slick in the artificial lights. Microphones are close enough to the field that occasionally one can hear the sound when the ball is kicked hard. It's not that satisfying thooomp that a well-struck dry ball makes; rather, it's a rather sickly-sounded sqvish. The commentators occasionally mention hot coffee wistfully.

There are plenty of spies in the audience. The TV cameras pick Tyresö's coach Stefan Fredriksson out of the crowd; he has a hat and scarf, and his jacket zipped up as much as possible, and he looks cold. Next week, his team hosts LdB in a game that will be televised (see below). The coach of Finland's national team, Andrée Jeglertz (ex-coach of Umeå IK), was in attendance, as were also two coaches of the Danish national team. They are wearing their "DBU" emblems and not even attempting to be subtle, as they diligently peruse LdB's pink, pink program. I guess it makes sense for them to be there; Malmö is, after all, practically a bedroom community for Copenhagen...

But how was the game? Well, it felt a little strange, to tell the truth. It was well played by both sides— all goals were well-taken and well-deserved, and there were no egregious errors that I could see. But it felt somehow bloodless, and devoid of emotion. The one yellow card awarded, against Linköping's Petra Larsson, was shown on reply to be a bit of a tug but really nothing bad-tempered. LdB's Nilla Fischer, who can usually be counted on to knock some people around, did cause one or two Linköping players to perhaps sit down harder than they might have otherwise (and indeed, Linköping's goal was the direct result of a free kick from just such a play), but there were no violent leans with intent to displace. Maybe everyone was just too chilled to want to waste energy.

The goals are below. Manon Melis' second goal is a beauty, as she really crunched it near-post. Her first goal, which looks a little odd, was shown on reply to be a nice touch made with just the very tip of her toes.

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When I saw that all the broadcast matches would be played on the same day, I was delighted because I could borrow a cheesy title for the coverage of these games (has anybody out there read "Tuesdays with Morrie"?). But the pattern has already broken down: next round's coverage has been switched to another game, one on Sunday rather than Tuesday, making a liar out of me. Instead of Hammarby hosting Linköping on Tuesday, TV4 will show Tyresö hosting LdB on Sunday.

I had been planning to go to that game. But Tyresö's field does not have a nice covered seating area like LdB's arena does, and I'm a sissy when it comes to weather, and that's okay because I'm not Swedish. All bets are off if there's a blizzard.