How Sweden dominated their game against the USWNT in the Olympics – tactical analysis

The Swedish Women’s national team faced the USWNT in the opening game of Tokyo’s 2020 summer Olympics and the game ended with a convincing 3-0 win for Sweden, a result that not many followers expected given the USWNT’s winning record in the last few years  especially during the last FIFA Women’s World Cup. Yet, Sweden did not give much attention to previous statistics and performed in an excellent way, marking this win in the history of Women’s football at the Olympics and in Sweden’s football history as well.

This tactical analysis will mainly tackle the USWNT’s defensive and attacking issues while exploring how were Sweden able to dominate the game, impose their playing style and score three goals without conceding any. The analysis will therefore include a mixture of mistakes to avoid and fix for the next games and on the other hand, tactical ideas, movements and performances to highlight.

Line-ups

Sweden started the game with the 4-2-3-1 formation with Hedvig Lindahl as a goalkeeper, Jonna Andersson, Nathalie Björn, Amanda Ilestedt and Bayern Munich’s Hanna Glas in defence, Caroline Seger and Filippa Angeldahl as central midfielders with Fridolina Rolfö, who has recently joined Barcelona, and Sofia Jakobsson as wingers and Real Madrid’s Kosovare Asllani as an advanced playmaker behind Stina Blackstenius, the team’s striker.

On the other side, the USWNT relied on the 4-3-3 formation using Alyssa Naeher as a goalkeeper, Kelley OHara, Manchester City’s Abby Dahlkemper, Becky Sauerbrunn and Crystal Dunn in defence, Lindsey Horan, Rose Lavelle and Sam Mewis as central midfielders while Tobin Heath and Christen Press played as wingers to support Alex Morgan upfront.

Sweden’s in-possession tactics

Peter Gerhardsson and his staff made sure that the players approached this game in a very determined way to not fall into the trap of the latest friendly game in which both teams drew after Sweden were unable to keep their advantage until the end. This friendly game gave the necessary boost for the Swedish players to believe more in their ability to beat the USWNT since they almost did it in the friendly game. Moreover, conceding a goal in the end allowed them to be more mature and more attentive when dealing with the American danger and attacks.

This leads us to highlight Sweden’s excellent transitions and exploitation of their possession moments in a quick and creative way during the game. Despite having a lower rate than the USWNT in terms of possession, with 49% for Sweden against 51% for the USWNT, Sweden knew how and when to be dangerous and score goals, as opposed to the USWNT. This supports the idea of the importance of knowing exactly how to exploit possession, plan on achieving tangible results through it and not just keep circulating the ball for the sake of it or just wait for an individual super effort. It also explains how Sweden studied the USWNT’s weaknesses in defence and tried to focus on them as soon as they had possession.

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