One week and counting

Sweden v. Mexico, Friendly
16 juni 2011, Gamla Ullevi, Göteborg, Sweden
Result: 2-0 (1-0)

The national team has been named, a schlager-y pop song has been chosen as an anthem, and now it's time to put the rubber to the road, as they say. The line-up: Sweden's Tall Two, the forward duo of Lotta "L8" Schelin and Jessica Landström are starting up top; in the midfield is youngster Antonia Göransson, captain Caroline Seger, Lisa Dahlkvist, and Louise Forsberg; the defenders are stalwart Sara Thunebro, hero-from-the-qualifiers Charlotte Rohlin, veteran Sara Larsson, and newbie Annica Svensson; Hedvig Lindahl, who's been Sweden's starting keeper for a number of years now, is in goal.

Overall, Sweden looked fit, active, and alert (game highlights). They took lots of shots, and if hitting the side-netting or top-bar was good enough, the score would have been more like 6-0. Schelin shone, being generally threatening with dribbling skillsand providing the hard work to move the ball forward and then the assist for Dahlkvist's opening goal, and also scoring a very nifty little one-touch goal herself, after a spot-on assist from Seger.

Did anyone disappoint? Not really. Landström did okay, at least, she did not entirely disappear, as she sometimes does, but on the other hand she certainly did not shine like Schelin. Forsberg, a generally reliable all-around player, had a couple chances that she failed to put on goal, one of them coming after some quite hard work by Landström and Therese Sjögran.

Sjögran is jet-lagged and late to training camp because her WPS team would not let her leave early; according to that report, she left Sky Blue's last match ten minutes before full time in order to catch her plane to Sweden. Now that's cutting it close. She came on for Göransson in the 53rd, and looked pretty good, lacking perhaps in the fine timing that her teammates have working on. If I were the paranoid type, I would suspect that someone in the US had a vested interest in holding Sjögran back... and after all, Sweden and the US are in the same group... nah, surely not, that's crazy talk. In the 49th minute, US coach Pia Sundhage is shown sitting in the stands, taking notes. "Who let her in?" I wonder to myself.

Sweden made five more substitutions starting around the 60th minute—local girl and ex-Bälingare Linda Sembrant in for Larsson, the perhaps-slightly-injured Nilla Fischer in for Dahlkvist, Lina Nilsson in for Svensson, Madelaine Edlund in for Landström, and the other debutante Sofia Jakobsson in for Forsberg. All looked just fine. That leaves four who got no playing time: forward Josefine Öqvist, who had light knee surgery earlier in the spring and has only recently returned to full training; twins Marie and Kristin Hammarström, midfielder and goalkeeper respectively, and the other goalkeeper Sofia Lundgren. I personally might have liked to have seen either back-up keeper come in for Lindahl at some point—they're both having fine domestic seasons, and Hammarström at least could use some international experience. But that's not such a large complaint, and overall it seems that the team on an even keel.

Sweden does play one more warm-up, against Japan on Thursday, and then The Big Dance starts just a week from today, with Nigeria playing France and then the official start, hosts Germany opening against Canada. Sweden's first game is next Tuesday, against Colombia. I'm starting to get excited about the tournament. I'm also getting nervous. Sweden looks... not so bad, really. Is that a feeling of hope stirring in my breast? I had better crush it now, before Sweden does it for me.