![](\"http:\/\/arewa.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/Women-World-Cup-Sweden-beat-Canada-1-0.jpeg\")
<\/p>\nBut it was a day of misfortune for the North Americans, who missed a penalty kick in the Round of 16 Match.<\/p>\n
In sweltering conditions at the Parc des Princes, the two teams struggled to register any shots on target in the first half in spite of Canada dominating possession.<\/p>\n
That all changed after the break when the Swedes stepped up a level and they were finally rewarded in the 55th minute when the Canadians lost possession of the ball in midfield.<\/p>\n
Kosovare Asllani played an inch-perfect diagonal ball to striker Blackstenius, who prodded the ball past onrushing goalkeeper Stephanie Labbe.<\/p>\n
It was her first goal of the tournament and it freed the Swedish team, which almost added a second with a thunderous drive from Fridolina Rolfo in the 61st minute.<\/p>\n
Canada had a chance to get back into the game after 68 minutes, when they were awarded a penalty kick following a lengthy VAR review ruling that Asllani had handled the ball.<\/p>\n
However, veteran Sweden goalkeeper Hedvig Lindahl dived to her right to tip Janine Beckie\u2019s spot kick away.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf they doubted I could make any penalty saves, that proved them wrong,\u201d Lindahl told reporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had to stretch fully and it worked. It was pure joy. We got a lot more energy because of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
The save appeared to suck the spirit out of the Canadians who struggled to create much beyond a few half chances.<\/p>\n
Asslani almost scored for Sweden five minutes from time as she volleyed in from a corner kick, but her shot was cleared off the line.<\/p>\n
It was the first time Canada had failed to score in a World Cup knockout match and coach Kenneth Heiner-Moller said his young squad would learn from the experience.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a lot of players with a bright future. They didn\u2019t get their chance, but it\u2019s given them a thicker skin. The way we develop players is important. We have the third youngest squad. So, it\u2019s looking bright,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Sweden will now face two-times champions Germany on Saturday in Rennes in a repeat of the 2003 final.<\/p>\n
The Swedes have not beaten the Germans since 1995.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s happened years ago isn\u2019t interesting. We have to look at how Germany played the last three matches,\u201d Swedish coach Peter Gerhardsson told a news conference.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s relevant to the players, but it will be nice to break that trend.\u201d\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sweden\u2019s Stina Blackstenius struck in the second half on Monday in Paris as they won 1-0 against Canada at the FIFA Women\u2019s World Cup to set up a quarter-final against Germany. But it was a day of misfortune for the North Americans, who missed a penalty kick in the Round of 16 Match. In sweltering […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":129936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[418,12546],"class_list":["post-129935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-canada","tag-sweden"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=129935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129935\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/129936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=129935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=129935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arewa.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=129935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}