Finland vs Sweden. Who will be stronger in the battle of the leaders of group B?

The favorites of the championship, the national teams of Finland and Sweden, will hold a head-to-head match of the group stage on May 18. The meeting of the two Scandinavian teams will be held in Tampere, on the ice of the Tampere Dec arena.

Our Expert Predictions & Analysis on Finland vs Sweden

Finland

In the last ten world championships, the Finnish team has reached the final five times, winning two golds and taking silver three times. If we add to this the Beijing Olympic gold and two bronze medals in Vancouver 2010 and Sochi 2014, it becomes clear that Finnish hockey is confidently taking the leading positions in the world. Additional points for the Finnish team are added by the venue of the current championship - they will play on home ice.

A characteristic detail of the coaching staff of Jukka Jalonen is the belief in hockey players who play in the local championship. This time in the application for the championship there was a place for only four representatives of the NHL (Syateri, Armia, Lammikko, Granlund), Dallas defender Miro Heskainen should appear closer to the playoffs, but for now the Finns are doing just fine without him. In the opening game with a score of 5-0, the Norwegians were defeated, goals were scored by Pesonen, Bjorninen, Rayaala, Armia and Sallinen. It was much more difficult for the Finns in the second game, when the Latvian national team was in rivals. After the first period, the hosts of the championship burned 0-1, and only the efforts of the first link, the Finns were able to succeed. In the middle of the second period, Manninen equalized, and Granlund set the winning point two minutes before the end of regular time.

Sweden

If Finnish hockey is on the rise, then the Swedes cannot boast of such. After gold at the 2018 World Championships in Denmark, Tre Krunur failed twice, losing in the quarterfinals in 2019, and last year did not advance from the group for the first time in their history. The Swedes had a great chance to rehabilitate themselves in Beijing, at the Winter Olympics, but the defeat in the semi-finals from the Russian team broke the Scandinavian team so much that they meekly lost to the Slovaks 0-4 in the bronze medal game.

Yukhan Garpenlev, who has been working with the national team for the last season, has another chance to improve his own reputation as a coach. Under this task, a pinpoint reinforcement was issued from the NHL, which mostly fell on the defensive line (Hellberg, Dalin, Gustafsson, Larsson, Ekman-Larsson). Of the forwards, only Asplund and Bemström represent the overseas league, which are difficult to attribute to star players. Like the Finns, the Swedish team started the championship with two victories. But if success in the game with the frankly weak Austrians was quite expected, then a confident victory over the Czechs 5-3 was a pleasant surprise. The hero of the match was Rasmus Asplund, who scored two goals against the Czech national team.

Finland vs Sweden

Statistics

The teams have met five times this season. Four times, at the stages of the Eurotour, the Swedes were stronger (3-2, 3-1, 2-0 and 4-3). The Finns won one victory, but it came in the group stage of the Olympic Games - 4:3. If we take the relationship of these teams at world forums, then here the last face-to-face game took place in the quarterfinals of the 2019 championship. The main time of the match ended with a score of 4-4, and the victory for the Finns was brought by an accurate throw in overtime by Sakari Manninen, who should also play in the upcoming meeting.

ODDs from download 1xbet

The bookmaker is inclined to believe that the Finnish team has more chances to win, the odds for this outcome are 2.08. The option with the victory of the Swedes can be taken for 3.15, a draw for 4.2. In terms of the overall performance of the teams, everything is quite expected: Total over (4.5) - 2.05, Total under (4.5) - 1.78. Install the 1xbet app and place a bet on the favorite!

Game Totals Prediction

Both teams have almost guaranteed to get into the playoffs of the championship, having won two victories each. There is no particular point in straining and demonstrating your maximum, so you should expect cautious hockey, where a reliable defense game will come to the fore. It is unlikely that the teams will please with an abundance of scoring chances, so we suggest focusing on the forecast - Total Under 5 with odds of 1.69.

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