Zuperman and Kryptonite

On Monday Sweden will announce its squad for the friendly against Croatia.  The last squad before the Euro 2012 squad.  Super-John Guidetti has recently completed back-to-back hat tricks for Feynoord against Twente and rivals Ajax and his tally is now 14 goals in 14 games, and quite a few assists on top of that.  19 year-old Guidetti's success reawakens the main discussion point around the Swedish national team over the last year: why is Sweden better without Zlatan? Should Zlatan even play as we seem to be doing better without him?

Let me state my piece.

Stats are pretty clear; Sweden performs better when Zlatan is not playing.  This has split the debate in two factions.  Faction one (at least in my mind primarily represented by those who usually represent small-town narrow-mindedness and short-sightedness in general) want to sack Zlatan from the team.  Faction 2 says Zlatan is our best player so he should play regardless of anything.

Why don't we, Moneyball-style, have a careful look at those stats? First, which stats are relevant?

What has been the apparent problem with Sweden with Zlatan on the pitch? In random order, he has (i) looked pretty disgusted by the random runs and passes by certain teammates and expressed that disgust in sometimes harsh language, (ii) looked uninspired and out of sync in the pressing game after losing possession and (iii) shot a truckload of freekicks in the ban wall.  Why is this and how do we correct it? The latter is maybe the easiest.  With Sebastian Larsson, Kim Källström, Andersson Svensson and Rasmus Elm on the team Zlatan better bend it like he did against Cagliari or not take them at all.

The first two are a bit trickier and here is where we should look more carefully at the stats.  Sweden under Erik Hamrén play what he refers to as 4-2-3-1 but what in my world is a pretty classic 4-4-2 where one striker is supposed to fall a bit deeper (the number 10) and one be more of a fox-in-the-box (the number 9).  Zlatan has declared that he should be the number 9 although he is by quite some distance our best passing player.  Hamrén has so far met this request.

I have tried to make sense out of the 21 games Sweden have played under Hamrén (excluding the January caps), looking at Sweden's performance (grading 1-5), whether Zlatan played, who else played up front, whether we played home or away, whether it was a qualifyer or a friendly and of course the result.

From a first glance, this comes out:

• Sweden's average performance (according to me) is 3.10.
• Sweden's performance with Zlatan is indeed worse, 2.83 versus 3.44 without him
• But Sweden is also worse with Elmander playing (3.0 irrespective if we take into account the games he played as a winger or not)
• Looking at individuals, Sweden is at its best with Toivonen playing (3.42 and then I am still not counting him as playing in the Finland game where Zlatan substituted him due to an early injury)

Looking a bit more on the game of games we played:

• There is a huge difference between home games and away games.  Sweden have been great at home (7 wins, 1 draw against Germany, no defeats, a goal difference of 24-5 and av average performance  at 4.0).  This is to compare with the away games where we have won seven and lost five (and drawn that neutral game against Ukraine in Cyprus).  The average performance is at 2.5

What about that Zlatan then?

• He started of pretty well. He had a good 2010 apart from the game against Holland when the entire Swedish team was unbalanced, and continued well in 2011 and peaked this spring against Finland.  At that point, Sweden with Zlatan had an average performance of 3.43.  It is really in the last five games that Sweden in general and Zlatan in particular have been lame.
• So Sweden has been lame in five out of the last six and brilliant in the sixth (against Holland) and the Holland game was the only one where Zlatan did not play.  Zlatan's fault then? Could be, but remember what I said about home games versus away games above.  Holland we played at home, the other games were away games.  And the combination of Zlatan on the pitch and playing away has been awful.  At home, when half the crowd is cheering more for Zlatan than for Sweden, Zlatan has not been bad at all.  That points to motivation (or lack thereof, rather) being Zlatan's kryptonite
• But what about Zlatan's buddy up front? Zlatan has played seven games with Elmander as his up-front partner.  The average is not very good, 2.57 with the best performance being Zlatan's solo show against Finland.  The only really good connect between the two we saw for a second in Cyprus against Ukraine, resulting in a great goal
• In the other five games, Zlatan has played with Toivonen.  The two have performed above average together, at 3.2.  Apart from the horrid performance against Holland, Sweden has also been pretty effective with the pair up front (goal difference of 15-0 but 11 of those scored against San Marino)
• But.  In four of those five games, Elmander has still started, as a winger.  Zlatan has thus only played one game under Hamrén without Elmander, at home in the comfortable 6-0 win against San Marino.

So what are the conclusions here?

• Sweden performs better without Zlatan when playing away
• Zlatan and Sweden performs better when Zlatan plays with Toivonen than when he plays with Elmander
• No other Zlatan options have been tested, and Zlatan has almost never played without Elmander on the pitch.

If Superman would always have had kryptonite in his pockets he probably would never have disovered his super powers.  Lack of motivation may be one thing, but I believe it makes sense for Hamrén to test Zlatan without Elmander before the Euro 2012.  For the friendly against Croatia I would like to see Hamrén start with Zlatan as number 10 and Guidetti as number 9, ask them to do 45 minutes but 45 intense minutes, with aggressive high pressure on the Croatian defense, and then let Toivonen/Elmander do the same in the second half.   That's my piece.

Elmander! And Elm! And all of them.

Getting some distance to the epic win, the beauty, the joy.  We are qualified after a qualification campaign where we played well at home but struggled away.

So as qualification campaigns go, not one of our best, but the ending was one of the most beautiful.  The Swedish national team in my life time are perhaps most known for memorable draws when it comes to the top teams: a bunch of them against England (1988, 1989, 1999, 2002, 2006), West Germany in 1985, France in 1992 and 1993, Brazil in 1994, Argentina in 2002, Italy in 2004.

When it comes to big wins in competitive games, there are not that many.  Excluding the days before I was born (beating Italy and Spain in the 1950 world cup, Germany in 1958 and so on), and discounting wins that were big because of their importance but not against the really big footballing nations (Poland 1989, Denmark 1992, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Romania and Bulgaria 1994, a bunch of more qualifier and tournament wins against Poland, Bulgaria and Hungary, Turkey 2001, Nigeria 2002, Paraguay 2006, we are left with a pretty short list: wins I have experienced against the big teams in competitive games.  Here they are, in chronological order:

29 May, 1983: Sweden-Italy 2-0. You may think that opening goal header from Håkan Sandberg was not very impressive.  But for being a PE teacher in Örebro, he was pretty accurate.  And then Glenn Strömberg, of course Glenn, took advantage of a pretty terrible Italian defensive header.

15 October 1983: Italy-Sweden 0-3. That Glenn again, securing a second win against the world champions.  How did we not qualify for Euro '84 after that? By losing twice to Romania, that's how.  I'm still upset.

3 June, 1987: Sweden-Italy 1-0. The absence of the clear goal opportunity red card at the time, a magnificent penalty save from Ravelli and a the longest 1-2 combination in history brilliantly set up and executed by He-Man cheeked central defender Peter Larsson made us believe in Euro '88 qualification.  Three on the trot against Italy.  But it went downhill after that.

17 June, 1992: Sweden-England 2-1.  Efter a period of dominating Italy, Engeland became our next victim.  Efter Sweden Glenn Hysén held England at Wembley in 1988 and then Terry Butcher stealing the show in 1989, Brolin decided to take the 1-2 to yet another level and securing a semifinal in our home championship in Euro 1992.

5 September 1998: Sweden-England 2-1.  Maybe more thanks to David Seaman than anyone else.  But a fantastic start to our most impressive qualification campaign ever, I think.

8 October 2006: Sweden-Spain 2-0. Up until last week, the last time Sweden looked really impressive.  The only game I could not watch.

And, then, the unforgettable 11 October 2011.

What ranks highest? The 1992 game is a championship game and secured qualification to the Euro semifinal.  That is hard to beat.  Beating Italy 3-0 away is near impossible, but these were world champions that were already out of qualification.

The game against Spain was against a Spain that had already lost points and that could not really afford losing many more.  It was against a team that was about to develop to be the best team in the world.

But for us, for Sweden, the Holland game is special as it secured qualifcation.  Similar to Turkey in 2001, there we were head to head against our rivals but here we played against a team with one of the most impressive winning streaks in history, save for the world cup final. 

You can make a case for any of those for as the biggest win under the belt in my lifetime.  So yes, 11 October was a big day.

Elm and... er...? II

Tomorrow.  Holland.  Not a must-win this time. But a very much wanna-win as a win means a ticket to Euro 2012 as best runner-up and with a draw we have a chance although my bet goes to Denmarl (kick-off changed, someone read my "No academic quarter" post).

How do we beat Holland? My previous line-up is obsolete given the suspension of Zlatan.  But I stick to my guns even if we will not have a strong but static target forward to aim for but rather a scared moose (hunting season, Zlatan knows): we should really play three central midfielders, with one of them operating higher up on the pitch, which in my world should be Källström as he is more prone to making passing errors.  Although we need speed, starting with two strikers (Elmander and Hysen) as many propose is not a good idea.  And Toivonen, nope,we cannot afford the luxury of a pure number 10 against Holland. So my line-up is:

Isaksson
Lustig, Mellberg, Majstorovic, M.Olsson
Svensson, Elm
Larsson, Källström, Wilhelmsson (or Bajrami, whoever is in best shape)
Elmander

Bench: Wilandh, J.Olsson, Bengtsson, Wernblom, Toivonen, Wilhemsson/Bajrami, Hysen.

But still, my feeling is we will need to start preparing for a play-off on Wednesday so I start already now.  Likely pairings as runners up right now are as follows (assuming that Denmark or Portugal claim the best runner-up spot; If not, it will be Sweden or Croatia, all of which as it seems would be seeded if they have to go into play-off):

Seeded (Ranking coefficient - not yet final):
Croatia (6) (the alternative, Greece, would also be seeded)
Sweden (10)
Serbia (13) (the alternative, Estonia, would be most unseeded)
Czech Republic (14) (the alternative, Scotland, would most likely be unseeded)

Unseeded:
Turkey (17) (the alternative, Belgium, is further down and not close to seeding)
Ireland (19) (could still be Russia who would be seeded, or Armenia who would not be)
Bosnia (20) (or France, that would be seeded)
Montenegro (30)

So from a purely Swedish perspective I should route for Estonia (38), the Scots (27), Belgium (33) and Armenia (37).

An unseeded bunch consisting of Scotland, Estonia, Mopntenegro and Armenia may not be easy but a whole lot easier than for example if Sweden drops in the rankings and face Russia, Croatia, France and Serbia on the other side.

Elm and... er...?

Tonight: Finland-Sweden.  Must win game. Nervous.

Coach Hamrén continues to play 4-4-2 against Finland (although of course it is called 4-2-3-1). I'm ok with that, I am in agreement to play Rasmus Elm although I am not sure at all that it was a good decision not to play Anders Svensson.  Elm called Svensson a fossile, or  actually the fossile, earlier this week.   Jokingly, but still. Anders and I are the same age, ready for a life on the bench.

But against Holland on Tuesday I would like to see a real 4-2-3-1.  I would like Svensson to come back on the starting XI, at the expense of Elmander.  I want us to play with three central midfielders, and I want to keep Elmander on the bench to come on if we need speed in the second half.

The road to Donetsk, Poznan and other places

Zlatan on the bench against Finland tonight.  How do we interpret that? Just that he is out of match form and hence not ready for 90 minutes.  And don't expect him to play unless we have to.  Disappointing for the ticket holders but they get summer weather and should not complain.

We should beat Finland and the 11 that started the second half against Moldova should be able to do it.

So not many comments to make.

But I can give you the predictions for the qualification campaign this autumn if you would like.

Such as the 16 teams that will participate in Euro 2012, in alphabetical order:

Croatia, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Greece, Holland, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine.

How do I get there? Afraid that's a longer story but sure, here we go:

Two teams are qualified as hosts, Poland and Ukraine.

Four teams are cruising through their groups and can already book their tickets; Spain, Germany, Holland and Italy.

The other five prospective group winners need to fight for their place, but I think the following teams will make it:

• England have screwed up a few times already and could screw up a few times more, but if they get their act together away against Montenegro that's pretty much all they need to do. And currently Enlgand appear to be stronger away from home
• France managed to get one point out of two encounters with Belarus.  A super power still on the decline, but with a helpful draw.  They really should qualify
• Portugal initially struggled in their Nordic group but seem to have found the necessary momentum and probably a draw against Denmark is all they need on the last day.  An interesting group where three games between three teams on equal points will be decisive.  Denmark-Norway and Denmark-Portugal.
• Croatia are not in the driving seat in their group and were minutes away from losing important points to Georgia this weekend.  But I think they will draw Greece away, and I believe Greece will draw at least once more (away to Israel or away to Georgia).  But this is a tough group.
• Russia, finally, are favourites in their three-horse battle with Slovakia and Ireland.  Again, all three teams are even but if Russia can manage a draw away to Slovakia and a win at home to Ireland that should suffice.

Then we have one more directly qualified, the best number two.

Looking at all groups, and the games played and the games to be played, the teams that can get the best results are:

• Sweden, could be second with only 3 points lost
• Turkey, 5 points (if Azerbijan finishes last and thus Turkey's loss against them is discounted, otherwise 8 points)
• Norway or Portugal, 5 points (but I think Portugal will win the group and Norway finish third). I predict Denmark to finnish second, and to do that they need to drop at least 7 points
• England/Montenegro, 6 points
• Czech Republic, 6 points
• Slovakia/Russia/Ireland, 7 points
• Greece/Croatia, 7 points
• France/Bosnia, 8 points
• Northern Ireland, 9 points

But here is a more likely scenario, I think

• Sweden, losing 7 points by drawing at home to Holland and away to Turkey, but winning two games against Finland and (discounting the San Marino games) with a goal difference of +6.
• Denmark, beating Norway at home and drawing Portugal at hoe, also dropping 7 points but with only 3 or 4 plus goals
• Greece, drawing two more games and losing 8 points
• Ireland, dropping 8 points after losing to Russia away but beating Slovakia at home
• Czech Republic, dropping 10-11 points in total after games against Scotland away and Spain at home
• Switzerland, catching up with Montenegro by winning all remaining games including the last game of the group against Montenegro and beating them and encounters between the two, dropping 10 points
• Turkey, dropping 12 points (trusting Azerbaijan to beat Kazakhstan in the first game between them that may trigger European wide interest)
• Serbia, dropping 14 points and just beating Northern Ireland and Slovenia
• Romania or Bosnia in the everyone-beats-everyone group, dropping 14 or so points

Fact remains, Sweden are favourites to go through as best number two and the extra goals we scored against Moldova were most helpful to the cause.

The other number twos will enter a play-off against each other, with the four best teams according to the FIFA ranking seeded.  That means, today:

Seeded
Denmark (or Portugal or Norway)
Greece (or Croatia)
Switzerland (or Montenegro or England)
Serbia (or Slovenia)

Unseeded
Ireland
Czech Republic (or Scotland)
Turkey (or Belgium, or Austria)
Romania (or Bosnia, Belarus or Romania)

The draws will decide but the seeded teams are more likely to qualify, it seems.  Serbia-Bosnia and Greece-Turkey sound like interesting draws.

If Sweden ends up being number 2 but not the best number 2, we are likely to be seeded (as last team) but a lot could change that:

• A team that would be unseeded (such as Turkey) qualifies as best number 2
• France finishes second in their group
• Russia or Slovakia finish second in their group (and Slovakia stays ahead of Sweden in the ranking)

On the other hand, helpful things such as (Northern Ireland or Israel finishing second) could swing things back.

So, a lot of differet scenarios but if you support Sweden here are some other games where you clearly should route for one team over the other:

• Israel-Greece (2 September) and Croatia-Israel (6 September): Cheer for the sons of Israel
• Azerbaijan-Kazakhstan 6 September: cheer for the Azerbaijans against the Caspian rivals from the glorious nation of Kazakhstan.  Actually, cheer for Azerbaijan in all their games
• Austria-Turkey, 6 September: Cheer for Austria
• Cheer for whomever is playing Montenegro, at least for the moment (will keep you posted)
• Cheer for whomever is playing the Czech Republic, in particular Scotland on 3 September and Spain on 7 October
• Cheer for whomever is playing Denmark or Norway.  Should not be a problem.

But first, let's go beat them Finns.

Deoxyribonucleic acid of a dinosaur

If I was surprised that Bedoya missed the U.S. Gold Cup, it was far more expected that Almebäck would miss out of Sweden's next two qualifyers against Moldova and Finland.  Mellberg and Majstorovic are back, and Iron Mike's form has been average.

But I have a non-Örebro point to make with this post.

Here's the likely Swedish line-up:

Isaksson
Lustig, Mellberg, Majstorovic, Wendt
Svensson, Källström
Larsson, Elmander, Bajrami
Ibrahimovic

At least that's how Hamrén would like to line it up, as 4-2-3-1 that revolutionises Swedish national team football.  The style that Zlatan described as "more modern, more offensive".  More modern and more offensive may eye, I say.  Given the qualities of these 11 players and the way they are expected to play for Sweden, admit that this looks more accurate?

Isaksson
Lustig, Mellberg, Majstorovic, Wendt
Larsson, Svensson, Källström, Bajrami
Elmander, Ibrahimovic

4-4-2.  Let's not deny our own DNA code.

On that note, the Swedish national team is having a dull moment.  The Holland game sucked the buzz and the feeling of something new and fresh out of the team.  So my comments are few and dry.

Absent injuries I think Hamrén have three questions for himself:

• The left back, Wendt or the infamous thrower-inner Safari? Hamrén will not bet on Safari in the end, Wendt comes in via the exclusion method
• The central midfielder next to Svensson?  I think Källström will be back on the team and Wernbloom on the bench, Boom-Boom has been terrible in his past few games for Sweden
• Where to play Elmander?  Elmander will play, I'm sure.  But Hamrén wants Larsson's delivery from the right.  So he needs to sacrifice Toivonen or Bajrami and as Elmander is stronger centrally (which was proven by his weak spring on the wing at Bolton) the wiser choice is to play him there.

The only notable thing on the rest of the squad is a possibly lack of players in central defence and midfield (only three in each). 

I also struggle to see the point in flying Christian Wilhelmsson in for the bench in national team games, but I guess it makes Zlatan happy.

All in all a better team then our opposition but not a team with enough quality and confidence to bag the points already now.  Far from it, actually.

The full squad:

Målvakter: Andreas Isaksson, Eindhoven, Johan Wiland, FC Köpenhamn, Pär Hansson, Helsingborg.
Försvarare: Andreas Granqvist, Groningen, Mikael Lustig, Rosenborg, Oscar Wendt, FC Köpenhamn, Olof Mellberg, Olympiakos, Daniel Majstorovic, Celic, Behrang Safari, Basel.
Mittfältare/anfallare: Sebastian Larsson, Birmingham, Kim Källström, Lyon, Anders Svensson, Elfsborg, Emir Bajrami, Twente, Martin Olsson, Blackburn, Pontus Wernbloom, AZ Alkmaar, Christian Wilhelmsson, Al Hilal, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Milan, Ola Toivonen, PSV Eindhoven, Johan Elmander, Bolton, Alexander Gerndt, Helsingborg, Tobias Hysén, IFK Göteborg

We don't fly but we may qualify

So. We lived through another unexciting performance from Sweden. If the option is between unexciting and disappointing, as it currently seems to be, I guess this was just about what we could wish for.  The inability of the Swedish

• defence not to make us nervous (too many free kicks conceded, too many uncontrolled passes from Antonsson who should never again play for Sweden I hope)
• midfield not to control the ball when the Moldovans increased the pressure (it will take not just one but a couple of injuries or suspensions before we see Wernbloom in the starting line-up again; Elm improved things when he came on, good to see)
• attack not to finish better (Zlatan's missed penalty was dreadful, Elmander ran but that was also all that he did)

do not bide well for the future qualification campaign.

But, still, other teams are doing what they should to help Sweden qualify.  We should finish second in this weak group, we really should, and we actually have a good chance of qualifying directly as the best runner up of all groups.

With the reservation that no one knows what will happen to Bosnia and hence the entire Group D, this is what seems to be going on:

Holland, Spain, Germany and Italy are cruising through their groups.  We can give them tickets to Euro 2012 already.

England and France are in good control of their groups although there is a little bit of work still to be done.

Croatia, Portugal and Russia look like the most likely winners in the three groups that remain really tight.

As to runners up, I think Denmark are in the best position to qualify as the best number two.  Sweden are not far beyond, but we need to see how Sweden behave in games away against the slightly worse teams before we can take anything for granted.  The other number twos will lose more points I believe and thus haev to qualify throw play-off against each other: Greece, Ireland, Czech Republic, Montenegro, Belgium, Bosnia (unless they are banned) and Slovenia.

And the wall came tumbling down

http://svenskfotboll.se/arkiv/landslag/2011/03/herr/

Mikael Almebäck aka Iron Mike is in the 20-man squad named for the Euro 2012 qualifyer against Moldova. 

When was the last time an ÖSK outfield player was in the Sweden squad for a competitive game?

I think Dan Sahlin was the last one. Sweden-Lithuania, 6 August 1997.

It took a while.  But then again Iron Mike is a man does not let stone walls stand in his way.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQnq28-2-bk

The madonnina is ours

So. Zlatan has scored the winner in his first derby for Milan. That pushed me over the edge.  I am now a blogger.

Who am I writing for? I guess mostly for all those people I have terrorized with football emails over the years.  And anyone else who wants to join the discussion.

What am I writing about? I guess there are no rules but judging from the functioning of my brain there will be little space for anything else but football.  And just to make things clear from the very beginning. I speak in "we" terms about three clubs and a national team. Orebro SK (I need to learn how to make umlauts on this machine very, there is one on the first O), AC Milan, Tottenham Hotspur and Sweden.  You better live with it.  Sure, I have a constant flirt with Atletico Madrid and I have had the occasional affair with teams like Celtic, Leverkusen and Feyenoord, but I am totally over them.  Orebro, Milan, Tottenham and Sweden will be the natural focal points of this blog.

And so we have just witnessed a Milan derby with the ingredients we could only have wished for.  Zlatan scored, Nesta was too cool for school, Gattuso was ready to kill and Materazzi nearly got himself killed.  Last week Bale thrashed Maicon in the Champions League.  What's next? Easy. Nordin Gerzic will sink the nerazzurri in next years Europa League.
 
That was a soft start. I hope to deal with the heavier stuff next week. That is Pippo, Astrit and Anttonen.