Graham Potter believes Alexander Isak and Viktor Gökeres will enhance much more in Sweden’s World Cup marketing campaign after their robust begin towards Tunisia.
Sweden put in a five-star efficiency of their opening Group F sport, profitable 5-1 on the Estadio Monterrey, with Isak and Gökeres each scoring.
Yassine Ayali opened the scoring with an excellent brace, whereas substitute Mattias Svanberg got here off the bench with an 84th-minute end and made an instantaneous impression.
Sweden’s 5 targets towards Tunisia had been their second-highest whole in a World Cup sport, after their 8-0 victory over Cuba within the quarter-finals of 1938, and it was Isak and Gokeres who shone.
Though his debut for Liverpool was marred by harm, Isak grew to become solely the second Swedish participant since 1966 to register one aim and two assists in a World Cup match, following Thomas Brolin towards Bulgaria in 1994.
Gökeres and Isak are the second Swedish team-mates to report a aim and an help, respectively, in a World Cup match since 1966, following Kennett Andersson and Martin Dahlin towards Saudi Arabia in 1994.
“Clearly individually they’re prime gamers, however I feel collectively they could be a actual menace,” Potter stated of the partnership between Isak and Gökeres.
“I feel the extra they play, the higher they get. They complement one another very properly. I am actually proud of the gamers.”
“We all know the standard of the people within the ahead positions, however they want a workforce to operate.
“We weren’t excellent. We knew we weren’t going to be excellent. However firstly of the sport, I assumed we had been in good management.”
Isaac x Gokere’s #FIFAWorldCup pic.twitter.com/peDSuqchn6
— FIFA World Cup (@FIFAWorldCup) June 15, 2026
With this end result, Sweden will enter the opening sport of the World Cup with two consecutive wins (2018), though they’ve did not win the primary match in every of their seven match appearances (D5 L2) from 1970 to 2006.
Japan leads the group after drawing 2-2 with the Netherlands. Their subsequent match will probably be this Saturday at Houston Stadium towards Ronald Koeman’s Sweden.
“We all know we will probably be taking part in towards a prime workforce subsequent and we have now to be prepared for that,” Potter added of the problem of dealing with the Netherlands.
In the meantime, Tunisia coach Sabri Lamouchi regretted the errors that led to Sweden’s aim, but in addition highlighted their struggles within the ultimate third.
Ramouchi’s facet completed with a complete anticipated targets (xG) of simply 0.28 on six photographs, whereas Sweden had Abdelmouhib Chamakh’s 13 photographs on aim for a complete of 1.33.
“We won’t get well from this expertise as a result of we have now two world-class gamers in our two Swedish forwards,” Ramouchi stated.
“We made too many errors. This can be a troublesome loss. It hurts. It is actually troublesome to begin a match with such a nasty loss.”
