Congratulations England! Even better than our prediction!
Our tennis predictor got it wrong, but we will settle for England 2, Sweden 0! Read on for our guide to the links between the tennis and football of Sweden and England, written before the match was played!
Two crucial sporting head to heads will take place this Saturday. An increasingly confident England against self-styled underdogs Sweden in the World Cup, and Kyle Edmund at Wimbledon, who is coached by a Swede. How does the record of the two nations, in two sports, stack up?
As England take on Sweden in the World Cup in Russia tomorrow, Kyle Edmund, the last Brit standing at Wimbledon, is likely to be facing Novak Djokovic at the same time. There is added tension in the tennis as Edmund’s coach, Freddie Rosengren, is a Swede.
England and Sweden have exchanged coaches before. The highly successful international football manager George Raynor lead the Swedish national football team to a World Cup final in 1958 (they lost to Brazil) and who can forget Sven Jorgen Eriksson, the first non-British manager of the England team. Eriksson lead England in two World Cups (2002 and 2006) and they met Sweden twice. Both matches ended in a draw. For Saturday’s match, Eriksson is tipping Sweden. But in tennis and in football, how do the two nations compare:
TENNIS |
England |
Sweden |
Host of a Grand Slam Event |
1 |
0 |
Grand Slam Singles won by a man in the Open era |
0 |
26 |
Grand Slam Singles won by a woman in the Open era |
5 |
0 |
Players at Wimbledon 2018 |
11 |
3 |
TOTAL |
17 |
29 |
FOOTball |
England |
Sweden |
Head to Heads |
8 |
7 |
World Champions |
1 |
0 |
English/Swedish coach of other nation’s football team |
1 |
1 |
TOTAL |
10 |
8 |
And the final score is 27-37, which once we apply the science of maths and a bit of rounding up, gives us the unsettling score line of: