Sports in Sweden

In Sweden, when you are going to school, the number of hours per week is relatively low. In addition, there are not many big cities where you can party; therefore if you live outside of the city, it can sometimes get very boring and lonely. For this reason, almost all the Swedes play sports. 

The main sports in Sweden are: Football (soccer), Bandy, Ice Hockey, skiing and Athletics.

The Swedish football team home ground is Råsunda Stadium in Stockholms län and their head coach is Erik Hamrén. Sweden made their first World Cup appearance in 1934. Since then, Sweden has made eleven World Cup appearances and four appearances in the European Championships. They finished second in the1958 World Cup, and third in both 1950 and 1994. Sweden's accomplishments also include a gold medal in the 1948 in the summer Olympics and bronze medals in 1924 and1952. They reached the semi-finals in UEFA Euro 1992.

Sweden’s traditional rivals are Denmark and Norway, although other rivalries have developed over the years. However, the biggest disappointment was in 2010 when Sweden failed to qualify for the 2010 World Cupin the group qualification stage. As a result, team manager quit and Erik Hamrén was appointed the new manager. Sweden's current captain is the well-known Zlatan Ibrahimović with Anders Svensson as vice captain.

Bandy is another popular sport in Sweden, for those of you who don't know, it is a ball game on ice that was introduced in Sweden in 1894. Notwithstanding this, the game is nowadays confined to: the Nordic countries, Russia, Netherlands, North America, and Hungary. The World Championships were introduced in 1957, and since then Sweden has taken 10 titles. Having been in Sweden myself many times, I can confirm that this game is very popular and can also be played on the ground (not only on ice), which makes is very easy and quick to find a spot to play on and have a good time with some friends.

The Swedish Ice hockey team, “Tre Kronor” has won one gold medal in 1994 and 2006, in the Olympics and they have six titles in the World Championships; in 1953, 1957, 1962, 1987, 1991, 1992, 1998 and 2006.

Ice hockey has always been a very popular sport in Sweden, both for the players, as well as the viewers. The broad base for recruitment lies in the many hockey-clubs all over the country. Every boy has on one occasion or another, tried to play Ice hockey.

Athletics is also a very popular sport in Sweden, the reason being; you can access a training area almost anywhere, there will always be one close to you. 

Sweden is also very good at skiing, considering that it is a Nordic country, there is a lot of snow during the year, therefore almost all the Swedes have skied, are skiing, or will ski in their life. There is therefore a lot of famous Swedish skiers male as well as female.

Anja Pärson, a very famous Swedish female skier