Petrén on the missed penalty: “It feels heavy”

After 23-23, Sweden is at least ready for the main round of the European Championship in Denmark.

In Saturday’s match between Sweden and Spain, there was after all no replay of the start of the match at the World Cup a year ago when Spain left and led with nine goals a good distance from the match before Sweden could come back and get a draw in the final seconds.

In the match for the European Championship, Sweden was at the end of the wheel. With 15 seconds to go, Spain’s Lara Gonzales received a red card, which according to the rules at the end of the match, penalizes opponents.

“Hard and bitter”

Melissa Petrén had scored several penalties in the game, but now she was in the post.

– It was sad that I couldn’t decide, but I think we could have decided earlier in the game. This is handball, he says.

– I didn’t feel nervous or stressed about taking the penalty, I just thought he would sit down.

Midfielder Linn Blohm says that before the match she thought a point against Spain would have been great.

– But now it feels hard and bitter. Tomorrow we will probably be happy with the points, says Blohm.

National team captain Tomas Axnér made many changes to the starting lineup, including veteran midfielder Bella Gulldén leaning in favor of Melissa Petrén, who played 200 fewer caps than Gulldén.

– It was a tactical decision, I chose the players according to the match plan, says Axnér.

Goals and failures

Petrén on the match schedule:

– We talked about playing at a high beat and with me and Jamina (Roberts). And it worked.

Petrén scored the most goals of the Swedes, eight, but fired 19 shots.

– It was good, sometimes I missed.

Sweden took a three-goal lead in the Euro Cup game at Herning in the 10th minute, 6-3. But just like in the European Championship premiere, Sweden had a hard time adjusting to the judges’ level of evaluation and suffered three expulsions in a row. So Spain could score four goals in a row.

Then the Swedish attacking game came to a halt and Spain was able to go into the break at 13-10.

The start of the second half followed the same pattern, the Swedish attack game did not work and the Spanish goalkeeper Silvia Navarro had to make too simple stops.

Slowly but surely, Sweden began to catch up with Spain. Partly because the balls started to fall forward, partly because Spain made so many mistakes in the attacking game. It was something that Axnér had in the game plan: to pressure the Spanish to make mistakes.

And with a quarter to play, Sweden took the lead for the first time in the second half, 19-18.

Filippa Idéhn replaces her goalkeeper colleague Jessica Ryde at half-time. He made some good saves at the end of the match. But Spanish goalkeeper Silvia Navarro had a save percentage of 42 and was the one who saved a point for Spain.

Fixed: In a previous version a quote had the wrong name. Linn Blohm is right.

Ingela Ahlberg / TT