{"id":1535,"date":"2026-04-01T04:29:21","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T04:29:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/?p=1535"},"modified":"2026-04-01T04:29:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T04:29:21","slug":"haaland-is-misfiring-and-odegaard-is-absent-should-norway-be-worried","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/?p=1535","title":{"rendered":"Haaland is misfiring and Odegaard is absent. Should Norway be worried?"},"content":{"rendered":"


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It is no surprise, given that Norway have not reached a major tournament since Euro 2000, that talk of the World Cup is everywhere.<\/p>\n

Pictures of Erling Haaland\u2019s face even pop up at the supermarket as a brand ambassador for the Norwegian Seafood Council: one of the stranger superstar athlete endorsement deals, perhaps, but one that feels appropriately Scandinavian. The fans are playing their part, too, with \u2018The oil mountain<\/em>\u2019, Norway\u2019s main supporter club, debuting the \u201cro<\/em>\u201d \u2014 a Viking row in the stands.<\/p>\n

It is their answer to Iceland\u2019s iconic thunderclap, which they hope will leave its mark in North America in the summer.<\/p>\n

Having qualified as one of just two teams in Europe \u2014 along with England \u2014 with a perfect record of eight wins from eight, they have grounds for genuine excitement and grander ambitions than merely taking part.<\/p>\n

Norway scored 32 goals in qualifying. That is one more than the defending champions Argentina, the next highest goalscorers, who played 10 more matches. Having perennially promised to be tournament dark horses since the emergence of Haaland and Martin Odegaard, they finally realised and firmly surpassed their potential.<\/p>\n

Qualifying in such dominant fashion is a significant achievement for a country where a sizeable portion of the population have no memory of singing their national anthem at a World Cup. The accomplishment was celebrated in the centre of Oslo, the nation\u2019s capital, with around 50,000 people cramming the streets late on a Monday night in the freezing November cold.<\/p>\n

Their national Ullevaal Stadion was packed out again to watch a 0-0 draw against Switzerland on Tuesday, their penultimate home match \u2014 they play fellow qualifiers Sweden in June in their final send-off \u2014 before heading out to the United States.<\/p>\n

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\"Norway<\/p>\n
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\n Norway fans cram into the Ullevaal Stadion to watch the goalless draw against Switzerland (Stuart Franklin\/Getty Images)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

It\u2019s difficult to draw too much from March international windows, particularly with a major tournament on the horizon. Big footballing nations have to deal with the intense, pressurised schedules of top players entering the final weeks of the season, and Norway have enough at that level these days. They are no different.<\/p>\n

Haaland was late to join up with the national team, having played 90 minutes as Manchester City beat Arsenal 2-0 to win the Carabao Cup on March 22. Odegaard has been in and out of the Arsenal side this season with persistent knee issues, causing him to miss successive international windows.<\/p>\n

Stale Solbakken is blessed with the most gifted and deep talent pool in the nation\u2019s history, but his coaching job is significantly more challenging without his chief goalscorer and creator.<\/p>\n

And still, Norway were marginally the better side on a poor pitch which Switzerland defender Manuel Akanji described as \u201cnot easy to play on\u201d in a post-match interview with Norwegian journalists. The hosts probably should have converted at least one of Alexander Sorloth or Jorgen Strand Larsen\u2019s back-post headers in the second half.<\/p>\n

But if momentum really means anything \u2014 Italy, who won Euro 2020 off the back of a 27-match unbeaten run and Argentina, who have now won three major tournaments in a row, would surely say it does \u2014 this international break has been a minor setback for Norway as they prepare for the most challenging group at the finals with France and Senegal confirmed opponents.<\/p>\n

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\"A<\/p>\n
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\n Alexander Sorloth\u2019s frustration is laid bare as Norway fail to find the back of the net (Terje Pedersen\/NTB\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

After taking the lead against the Netherlands on Friday, Norway were comfortably second-best for most of the match and lost 2-1, with goals from Premier League duo Virgil van Dijk and Tijjani Reijnders. Then came the stalemate in Oslo. For a side that has recently become accustomed to winning, the results over the March break have taken the wind out of their sails slightly.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe still feel confident,\u201d Norway and Bodo\/Glimt midfielder Patrick Berg told The Athletic<\/em>. \u201cOf course, we wanted to play against two good teams, and both the Netherlands and Switzerland are two top European national teams. So, for us, it\u2019s valuable just to get the practice.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we go to the World Cup, we will be ready to compete against the best teams. And of course, we missed a couple of players that are important for us in the first game against Netherlands, and now in the second game we rotated the squad a bit more to get everybody playing. So we\u2019re quite happy with the two games, even though we lost the first one and drew here.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Norway to return to their impressive qualifying form, they will need their stars fit and firing. Currently, however, their difference makers are either not fit, not firing, or both.<\/p>\n

Haaland\u2019s first act of the game was to collect the award for the top scorer in World Cup qualifying, but his goals have dried up in 2026.<\/p>\n

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\"Erling<\/p>\n
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\n Erling Haaland struggled to make an impact against the Swiss (Stuart Franklin\/Getty Images)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

He has netted just three times in 11 Premier League matches for Manchester City this calendar year and failed to fire off a shot against the Swiss before he was replaced after 63 minutes. He wore the captain\u2019s armband in Odegaard\u2019s absence, with the Arsenal playmaker having struggled for both fitness and form this term. Five league assists in 20 matches is not a poor return, but he is capable of much more.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the promising\u00a0Oscar Bobb has not yet established himself as a starter for Fulham since moving from City in January for around \u00a327million ($37.1m), and looked indecisive and short on confidence in his cameo from the bench.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not just the Haaland and Odegaard show, of course, with Sorloth and Strand Larsen impressive deputies at the front end of the pitch. At the same time, the defence looked solid and accomplished.<\/p>\n

Yet, Norway\u2019s ceiling is significantly lowered if their best are not at their best.<\/p>\n

And with the nation rising from the stands to the supermarkets to celebrate its first World Cup in a generation, it would be a shame if their elite players did not arrive with the confidence to lead the team on the deep run it has the potential to achieve at the finals.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is no surprise, given that Norway have not reached a major tournament since Euro 2000, that talk of the World Cup is everywhere. Pictures of Erling Haaland\u2019s face even … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1536,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1535"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1535\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipsport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}