Sweden W vs USA W prediction: WORLD: World Cup Women – Play Offs betting tips on match 2023-08-05 09:00.
Sweden will go into their Round of 16 FIFA Women’s World Cup (WWC) encounter with reigning champions the USA in the unusual position as group winners ahead of their opponents. The Scandinavians were one of just three teams (alongside Japan and England) who progressed from the group phase with nine points after their victories over South Africa and Italy and Argentina. Head coach Peter Gerhardsson chose to make nine changes for the final Group G game against Argentina, so there should be no sign of fatigue from his charges here.
Despite the country’s relatively small size, the Swedes have an impressive WWC pedigree, reaching the 2003 final and finishing third in 1991, 2011 and 2019. Intriguingly, they saw off the long-undefeated USA 3-0 in their last meeting at the delayed Tokyo Olympics, but with that just one of eight historical H2H victories (D12, L23), those victories are few and far between.
Meanwhile, their upcoming opponents have come under fire from former players and the national media after squeezing through to the knockout stage with a goalless draw against Portugal. In response, captain Lindsey Horan jumped to the defence of her team, insisting that the critics have “no idea” about the work going on behind the scenes. That’s despite head coach Vlatko Andonovski inheriting a significant legacy from Jill Ellis, who led the Stars and Stripes to back-to-back WWC titles in 2015 and 2019.
Despite their struggles at this tournament, the USA have a favourable WWC H2H record against Sweden, winning four of their six previous meetings (D1, L1). Remarkably, the last five of those clashes have come in as many tournaments, with the most recent of those matches seeing the North Americans win 2-0 and all six witnessing the half-time result replicated at full-time.
Key battle: Sweden goalkeeper Zećira Mušović was rested for the Argentina game despite letting in just two goals in her last four international matches, conceding none prior to half-time during that period. Meanwhile, USA skipper Horan opened the scoring after just three minutes the last time these sides met at a WWC, and after scoring in the USA’s first two games at this WWC, she’s now one strike away from 30 international goals.
Hot streak: The USA have won their opening knockout match at every WWC to date, scoring at least twice in all but one of those games.