Sweden down England to finish third at World Cup

Nice (France) (AFP) – Sweden ended their women’s World Cup campaign on a high by beating England 2-1 in Saturday’s third-place play-off in Nice, as Sofia Jakobsson’s first-half strike proved to be the winner.

England were looking to claim the bronze medals for the second successive World Cup, but it was Peter Gerhardsson’s side who finished third for the third time.

Kosovare Asllani gave Sweden an 11th-minute lead, before Jakobsson curled in an excellent second midway through the first half, and although Fran Kirby quickly pulled one back, England could not find an equaliser.

It was a second defeat in under a week for Phil Neville’s Lionesses, after suffering their third straight major tournament semi-final loss when beaten 2-1 by reigning champions the United States on Tuesday.

The Americans will face the Netherlands in the final in Lyon on Sunday.

England, whose men’s team also lost the third-place play-off in last year’s World Cup to Belgium, started slowly and were made to pay for slack defending as Asllani put Sweden in front.

Left-back Alex Greenwood was at fault, totally miskicking an attempted clearance straight to Asllani, who drilled a low finish into the net.

Neville’s team were all over the place at the back and almost fell two goals down inside the quarter-hour when Jakobsson ran clear and fired against the post.

The Montpellier winger was not to be denied in the 22nd minute, though, cutting inside and bending the ball past the despairing dive of England goalkeeper Carly Telford.

An end-to-end opening period continued as Kirby, back in the English starting line-up after coming on as a substitute against the Americans, clipped the ball in off the far post to score her first World Cup goal.

Ellen White thought she had equalised less than two minutes later with a tournament-leading seventh goal, but was denied by VAR review for handball.

White had also seen a goal ruled out by VAR in the loss to the USA.

The 30-year-old, level at the top of the scoring charts with US star Alex Morgan, almost equalised again on the stroke of half-time but shot straight at Swedish ‘keeper Hedvig Lindahl.

England dominated the ball for much of the early stages of the second half, but Sweden, who lost to the Dutch in extra time in their semi-final, held firm and Telford had to be alert to keep out substitute Julia Zigiotti Olme’s long-range drive.

from World Soccer Talk https://ift.tt/2JlpMeE