Norway’s men haven’t made it to a football championship for 25 years, but the women have, and just won a new spot in the next European Championships. Now they’re waiting to see who’ll they’ll be up against when group play is announced later this month.
When the women’s team beat Northern Ireland’s by a score of 3-0 on home turf last week, they also qualified for the next European championships in Switzerland. Football commentators noted that most of their recent opponents have been weaker than the Norwegians, allowing several other shutouts in recent months when up against Croatia, Finland and Albania.
They didn’t do as well against the Netherlands (tying one match 1-1 and losing another 1-0) and some wonder whether they’ll be able to beat other bigger countries in next summer’s championships known as EM (for Europeiske Mesterskap in Norwegian). Norway has some of the world’s best players, though, including Caroline Graham Hansen, Guro Reiten and Ada Hegerberg.
Coach Gemma Grainger said goals will be set when the team next meets in February. “We want to come out of the championships in such a way that we can look one another in the eye and say, ‘we were the Norwegian team we wanted to be,'” Grainger told newspaper Aftenposten. “If we do that, there’s no limit to what we can achieve.”
NewsinEnglish.no staff
