June 27, 2001

Sweden and Germany both win

Sweden 4 England 0

By Thorsten Frennstedt & Colin Aldis

At the second match of the Euro finals England had to play Sweden, a team they have beaten only once in 12 meetings and drawn 3 times. Now in the city of Jena they lost to Sweden again 4-0 (2-0).
Last time they won was in 1998 in Dagenham, England 1-0, the first match under their Head Coach Hope Powell.
Sweden scored their first goal after just 2 minutes of play when Jane Törnqvist headed in a ball from Malin Andersson. England never were able to threaten Sweden and played very defensively leaving just Angela Banks up front. Kristin Bengtsson made it 2-0 after 27 minutes. It was hot, about 35°C and the team not fit enough to run for 90 minutes suffered the most. It was the English squad. Sweden occasionally lacked pace as well. In the second half the differences in physical strengh became obvious. Hanna Ljungberg scored to make it 3-0 in the 74th minute, and Sofia Eriksson in her first Championship game put a corner kick in at 82 minutes. England received two Yellow Cards (Sue Smith and Samantha Britton). Hanna Ljungberg was named as the MVP of the match.

Germany 5 Russia 0

By Thorsten Frennstedt

Russia held Germanyfor most of the first half, but two minutes before the end Bettina Wiegmann scored to make it 1-0. The game ended in a 5-0 win for the German Champions. Birgit Prinz scored in the 50th, Maren Meinert in the 69th. Sandra Smiesek scored the two last goals in the 70th and 89th minutes. Pia Wunderlich and Maren Meinert did most of the heavy work in the game.

The English side can only fear for the match in Jena on Saturday. The Germans can only be defeated by one team in the Euro finals. That is Norway. The win of the group is practicly for sure.

6,249 watched the match in Erfurter Steigerwaldstadion. Unfortunately only the home team attracts the most spectators in the Euro finals.