Let's check in with Olof (Swedish Football)

[LondonLax]

Djurgarden won’t throw it away from here surely 

[sne]

Congrats to DIF for the gold.

Blåvitt with a solid 7-1 victory to close out the season, delighted for Lasse Vibe to score in front of the home fans in his final game for the club.

Also delighted for Alhassan Yusuf to score a brace, interesting to see what happens to him now.

Absolutely vital 90th minute goal for Falkenberg to keep them in the league and relegate Eskilstuna.

Kalmar have to play another 2 play off games to see if they remain in the top flight.

Edited November 2, 2019 by sne

[Tegis]

Evil trifecta of possible winners, being in Malmö-country amuses me.

[sne]

Gotta hand it to the top 2 flights of Swedish football.

What it lacks in quality it makes up for in excitement.

The promotion and relegation battle in Superettan is just as close as the title race in Allsvenskan was yesterday.

Thrilling stuff.

96th minute equalizer for BP conceded by Jönköping ends their season and hands the play off spot to Brage.

BP still relegated. Mjällby and Varberg promoted to Allsvenskan

Edited November 3, 2019 by sne

[Pelle]

Just love it that Falkenberg will be play another season in the top flight. And then have a historic derby against Varberg, while Halmstad remains in Superettan. Never thought I'd live to see that. To all you none swedish these clubs are all from the small county (?) Halland. Halmstad BK have always been the big club and have 4 titles, Falkenberg is the smallest town of the 3 and are now ready to play their 5th season ever in Allsvenskan, and that in 6 years. And before that they've never really been close to reach it. Only famous players are Pär Zetterberg and Niklas Eliasson in bristol. Varberg have never really been close to get there and are now ready for their first top flight season. Falkenberg as a city has always been the little brother to Varberg, while Halmstad is kind of the father or something. All 3 beautifull towns on the west coast. And yes, I'm from Falkenberg.  if anyone missed that.  

[sne]

Östersund denied "Elitlicense" as in the are not deemed to fulfill the criteria needed to play in the top flight of Swedish football for next season due to financial reasons.

As it looks now they will be demoted and Brage will take their place in the Allsvenskan.

Quite the fall from a few seasons back when they won the Swedish cup and played in the knock out stages of the Europa League.

[sne]

Legendary former IFK Göteborg chairman Gunnar Larsson has died at the age of 80 after getting infected with Covid-19

During his 20 years as chairman IFK won 10 Swedish championships, 3 Swedish cup and 2 UEFA Cups. The only European titles a Swedish club has ever won.

IFK also qualified for the then much smaller Champions League group stages and knock out stages 4 times during the 90's. 

He also helped drive IFK's finances into the ground sadly before he left but still, no Swedish club will ever come close to what IFK did under his leadership.

 

In other news the Allsvenskan is starting again in June it has been decided. I remain hopefully optimistic that it won't.

[sne]

So Swedish football is back as of today, had slipped my mind and only found out when i was channel hopping and they showed a game.

Since it was IFK Göteborg - Elfsborg I had it on in the background while doing other stuff. The game was god awful, first game of the season and no pre season so understandable but still. It was pathetic.

No idea if it was due to the empty stadium but Elfsborg won away at IFK for the first time since 2003.

Anyway, now I've watched a bit of Allsvenskan. Can't wait for the season to be over, only 29 more games to go, I will not be watching this farce.

[Zatman]

IFK are crap anyway so dont see the issue

Not even the best team in the city anymore 

Edited June 14, 2020 by Zatman

[Zatman]

Hacken had IFK number for a while

[sne]

38 minutes ago, Zatman said:

IFK are crap anyway so dont see the issue

Not even the best team in the city anymore 

Well you're not wrong.

Apart from the best team in the city stuff. Häcken are not true Gothenburg, they also play on plastic so they don't count. 

[Zatman]

3 hours ago, sne said:

Well you're not wrong.

Apart from the best team in the city stuff. Häcken are not true Gothenburg, they also play on plastic so they don't count. 

Well Hisingen is prime Gothenburg so don't see the issue went derby 2 years back and were stuffed 4-1.

[sne]

8 minutes ago, Zatman said:

Well Hisingen is prime Gothenburg so don't see the issue went derby 2 years back and were stuffed 4-1.

Nah, they are islanders 

Back when I lived in Gothenburg both Örgryte,, GAIS and Västra Frölunda played in Allsvenskan.

 5 teams from Gothenburg at the same time at one point, then 3 of them got relegated in the same season  

[Zatman]

1 hour ago, sne said:

Nah, they are islanders 

Back when I lived in Gothenburg both Örgryte,, GAIS and Västra Frölunda played in Allsvenskan.

 5 teams from Gothenburg at the same time at one point, then 3 of them got relegated in the same season  

well as an OIS fan that lived in Hisingen  Hacken have become the best team  in the city  

[sne]

Long interview with Olof in one of the Swedish papers today.

Will likely be behind a paywall before long but here it is google translated.

Quote

"I'll never get over it"

Olof Mellberg in a big interview before the premiere

 

Helsingborg. Tipped on the lower half, bankrupt association, wrongly balanced squad and major injury problems.

But Olof Mellberg is always Olof Mellberg:

- I will be incredibly disappointed every time we lose.

Meet HIF's coach in a long interview about jealousy at Malmö FF, life in Helsingborg, the penalty shootout in the European Championships and what he did when he "disappeared".

Just minutes before the interview will begin, while Sportbladet is waiting for Olof Mellberg at Olympia, the message will be that Ola Toivonen is now officially ready for Malmö FF.

- I actually coached Ola in the football school in Degerfors, says the nine-year-old Mellberg, who came to the mill and talent factory as a 17-year-old.

After the interview, the undersigned will continue to Toivonen's press conference down in Malmö.

- Greet him that I thought he would return to Degerfors, smiles Mellberg.

They made a championship together - the European Championship 2012, which became Mellberg's last.

From that squad we find. besides Mellberg, also Andreas Granqvist and Martin Olsson in HIF. In fact, as many as 17 of the 23 European players returned to the Allsvenskan (plus Anders Svensson who had already returned to Elfsborg).

- It's fun for the Swede. It feels like there are good traits around the Swedes, even if they are not among the highest ranked or have the most money, says Mellberg.

Do you get jealous of MFF when they can take the Toivonen home to such an already wide squad?

- Yes I am. Especially in this situation with such intense matching. We didn't really build that way from the start but wanted to have the tip, which was tough in itself with the financial space we have.

Or rather the non-space. The black headlines about HIF's acute economic crisis have been numerous lately.

Are you affected by the headlines in the squad?

- I do not think so. We have rubbed off with ours. But it does affect the squad building. We released Charlie (Weberg) and (Daniel) Hafsteinsson on loan. Before that, we had hope of bringing in at least one player, a "six" in the midfield. When we lent them both, we hoped to bring in two new ones. Then we got rid of another in a hill in Egzon (Bejtulai) which also had to be replaced.

Add to that the damage to several defenseless players right now and Mellberg seems anything but happy with the situation the days before HIF's premiere against Varberg, who will be his first all-Swedish premier as coach since he joined HIF midway through the season last year.

- We don't have a good squad balance now. We have quite a few offensive players but very few defensive ones.

You must step in yourself? How good is the shape?

- It is bad. I wrestle with old man and other, the 42-year-old smiles.

But a few days after the interview was made it became clear that the midfielder and former IFK Gothenburg player Mix Diskerud will be hired.

Another problem for HIF is the changed match schedule due to corona.

- In the original program we only had grass matches for the first 11-12 rounds. There we saw a small advantage. We could almost split the season into two periods based on data.

Now, instead, there will be two artificial turf matches during the first six rounds that are nailed.

HIF chooses not to prepare for artificial grass prior to the away matches on "plastic" as the, in itself rather newly constructed, artificial green grass used in the pre-season is not enough.

- It is so different from the artificial turf we play on allsvenskan so it is not even worthwhile to place individual passports there. It is only negatively affecting holding and changing.

"Don't want to talk about it too much"

HIF has not set any investment objective this year.

- Logically, in terms of budget, we get pretty far down. Unfortunately, that correlation is very good in football with some decimal difference. Realistically, we are down there somewhere. Therefore, it is sad to say a boring placement. But we have a good chance in every game we play. It will be more fun to have the goal of winning every match. Unfortunately, we will not do that, but we have that goal. And I will be incredibly disappointed every time we lose.

How should HIF play then?

Mellberg has labored a lot with the formations during the long preseason and last week before the premiere he has closed almost all the training, which was a lot muttered by the older guard supporters behind Sportbladets envoy on the small stand at the training before the interview.

Mellberg is like a clam when it comes to his own game and formation.

- I don't want to talk about it too much. We have a pretty bad track on the opponents as it has been a long time without matches. Then we do not want the opponents to know too much about us.

You don't want to invite them to something?

- No, we have worked for a long time with different formations and tried our way.

But can you tell if there are four men in the back line and two strikers?

- It doesn't have to be.

We will return to this with tactical flexibility a little later in the interview.

Mellberg has never been keen to talk about life outside football. He still isn't. But after a bit of lyric, we at least get a little picture of his life in a new city since he fell last fall, when he was thrown right into the all-Swedish season, described his new everyday life with just jobs, jobs and even more jobs .

He has an apartment in central Helsingborg while his family, wife and two children, live in Stockholm.

- So it won't be a lot of free time here. When given the opportunity, I go to Stockholm and sometimes they come here.

- If I have been able to spend my free time then I have played some padel and tennis, which I have really done since I quit as a player. But now, as I said, I have problems with old man.

Another old friend from the national team, Henrik Larsson, also lives in Helsingborg.

He also likes to play padel?

- Yes, but I haven't actually played with him yet. I have some others I play with. However, we have met several times and have a good contact.

Have you made a living here?

- Most things revolve around football when I'm here, but through Henke I've got to know some people.

Can you relax or it will almost be just a job when you are in Helsingborg and the family is away?

- I don't mind going out for a long day's work. Sometimes I bring the toad when I sit and eat and work a little. So it will be half relaxation and half job.

Will there be many dinners on your own?

- Yes, it will be. But I have no problem with that.

What do you say about Helsingborg as a city?

- It's a fantastic city. You can see that with the naked eye. Then there is a fantastic environment here and around Olympia. It's a real sports town.

- Since then I have always liked this part of Sweden; the route from Helsingborg up to the Bjäre peninsula via the Kulla peninsula. Especially the villages along the road there and nature.

Have you had any detours there?

- Yes I have. I played a lot of tennis when I was younger and have spent many summers in Båstad. It is nostalgia to drive in there.

Disappeared for a year and a half

Since he stopped playing, Mellberg has been under the radar for periods of time. Like when he dropped out as coach for BP after bringing them from division one to the Allsvenskan in two years (2016-17).

Mellberg "disappeared" and did not show up until 1.5 years later, in July last year, as manager of Fremad Amager in the Danish second league, where he only stayed for a few months before HIF heard of it.

What did you do during those 1.5 years?

- I watched a lot of football on TV, especially on high level football. I scouted a lot, analyzed a lot, read a lot. And then I went to the trainer training. I still do and have some left. And then I got involved in youth football again.

Specifically in the Bromma Boys P05 team, which he started training when the talents were nine years and where his son also plays.

During his active career, Mellberg played in the Premier League, Serie A and La Liga, in teams such as Aston Villa, Juventus and Olympiakos and under coaches such as Martin O'Neill, Claudio Ranieri and Ernesto Valverde.

He should have an incredible network of contacts in top football with the opportunity to make study visits with the biggest clubs and top coaches when he has now decided to invest in a coaching career.

How many study visits have there been?

Zero.

Why?

- I have chosen to be inspired in other ways. I chose a slightly different route into the coach job as well. I started in youth football and then in division one with BP. I wanted the main responsibility directly. When everything is at the forefront and I have the main responsibility, I have to get into everything. Career tactics might have been smarter to throw themselves into a major club directly but lower down the organization. But I did not think career wise.

- I think it was really useful and instructive for me to become head coach directly. I really wanted to dig myself into it. I made sure to get a good staff and then ...

Here Mellberg really lights up and it glows in his eyes.

- ... we started rubbing. We turned and turned on everything. It was tactical flexibility in absurdum, I would say.

It was so?

- Yes, not one match was the other equal. I do not think there is a formation that we did not play, mostly in one but also in the superetta. We also dominated matches against top teams in the Allsvenskan and went to the semi-finals in the Swedish Cup.

Among the players were Viktor Gyökeres, Felix Beijmo, Junior and Carl Starfelt.

- We had a group that was extremely receptive and who liked to turn and turn things around. We had a tremendous development. It was very developing for me too.

But tactical flexibility is not an end goal for Mellberg. Not at all, he says.

- In a perfect world you play the same way. I believe in continuity. Last year, Djurgården won basically the same game mode all the way and the year before, AIK did.

Dumps the question of BP

Mellberg was succeeded in the Bromma boys by Portuguese Luis Pimenta, who was fired nine months later after players on the team accused him of bullying, penalism and sexism.

BP left the Swedish team later in the fall.

How did it feel?

- I had quite a lot of distance from it and actually not much control.

But did it feel like much of what you had built up was raging?

- It is better that you ask those who were then.

But most people in football Sweden had an opinion or idea about what was happening and you were in the club, too?

- From the media, you mean? I try to avoid creating an opinion based on writing. But it was a boring season at all. Then it went downhill fast. Sin!

BP raced straight through the super league last year and will play in division one this year.

The punishment is still prevalent

That Mellberg would become a passionate elite coach, or football coach at all, could hardly have any idea that he encountered him during the first half of his playing career.

Mittbacken's lack of interest in football was evident and in an interview before the 2006 World Cup he told me that he had not followed any World Cup before 1994. At the time he was still 17 years old.

How did that transformation come about?

- It probably happened gradually. For the last ten years as a player I was quite interested in the different pieces of the coach role. I watched football more and more and became more interested in the whole. Then I had the luxury of being in an environment of the extreme elite. At the beginning of my career, most teams worked the same way. Then the professionalism increased and by the end of my time in the Premier League the training methods and diet became more and more accurate. Then I came to Juventus (2008) and there it became more professional by automatic. A little later came the tactical flexibility. I have had good coaches along the way but also very accurate leadership staff, which I learned a lot from.

Mellberg himself played six championships for Sweden between 2000 and 2012.

Many people believe that since 1994 Sweden has never been closer to going really far than at the 2004 European Championships. Then Mellberg missed the decisive penalty against Holland in the quarterfinals.

He still hasn't gotten over that miss.

- No, I never will. It affected so much.

The old center-back himself thinks that he had the greatest chance at the 2002 World Cup.

- Then we could really have gone all the way. We won the Death group and then our half opened up in the draw. It felt like we were better than Senegal too. We pressed and then they got a quick change and then "push" it was over, says Mellberg.

https://www.aftonbladet.se/sportbladet/a/vQjQw4/jag-kommer-aldrig-over-det

[Zatman]

Helsingborg were battered tonight at home to Varbergs who I think are newly promoted. Not a good start for Olof  

[Zatman]

Helsingborg leaked 4 more tonight, this is a terrible start and from the stats they are creating very little

[sne]

Another game without being able to score for HIF and Olof Mellberg.

375 minutes and 4 straight games without a goal. Last in the table with 0-8 in GD.

[Zatman]

another goalless game for Olof, starting to think he has been watching the Paul Lambert videos for research  

the difficult games are coming up as well

[Hornso]

Needs to turn around and quickly I'd imagine or he'll be available for new employment.