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Published : 02 Jun 2026, 10:53 AM
Norway signed off their World Cup preparations on home soil with a resounding 3-1 win over neighbours Sweden on Monday as the country rides the crest of a sporting wave not normally seen outside the Winter Olympics.
With striker Erling Haaland watching from the stands, Jorgen Strand Larsen scored either side of a cracker from winger Antonio Nusa to race into a 3-0 first-half lead, and a second-half goal for the Swedes from Alexander Isak did little to dampen the enthusiasm of the Norwegian fans as they look forward to their first men's World Cup finals in 28 years.
"I feel like we just have to keep doing what we've been doing for a long time now, just keep enjoying ourselves and it will be fun soon," a beaming Nusa said after the final whistle.
On Sunday, sports-mad Norwegians saw their ice hockey team stun Canada to secure the bronze medal at the world ice hockey championship in Zurich, for the nation's best-ever finish in the tournament, and that squad was honoured at half-time on a grey evening in Oslo that still sparkled with sporting joy.
Before the game, the Norwegian players were shown a video message from cross-country skiing legend Petter Northug, whose entire glittering career was one long rivalry with the Swedes, with the Norwegian emerging victorious more often than not.
"Make me proud. Humble them. Incite them. It's okay to be a little on the edge," Northug said in the video, and the players took him at his word.
"When the king speaks, he who has beaten Sweden so many times, you just have to follow up," defender Leo Ostigard said.
The Norwegians brushed aside the stumbling Swedes and will take on Morocco in a friendly in New Jersey on Sunday before beginning their World Cup Group I campaign, which will pit them against Iraq, Senegal and France.
For Graham Potter's Sweden, who will contest Group F against Tunisia, Japan and Netherlands, the game was a forgettable one as they repeatedly fluffed their lines, but they got some comfort from an unlikely source.
"Nobody will remember this game if Sweden go further than Norway in the World Cup. This was a friendly," skier Northug told Swedish newspaper Sportbladet, for once declining to twist the knife on his Swedish rivals.
