Arsenal’s Amanda Ilestedt wins FIFA award at Women’s World Cup by Michelle
Swedish international Amanda Ilestedt, who was Arsenal Women’s first signing in the summer transfer window, has received the Bronze Ball Award for her performance at the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 in Australia & New Zealand.
Sweden finished 3rd in the World Cup tournament, with England’s Lionesses securing 2nd place behind the Final winners Spain. Sweden are one of the best teams in the world and are ranked no.1 in the world by FIFA after this tournament. Amanda joins 2 of her Swedish teammates at Arsenal, Stina Blackstenius & Lina Hurtig.
Ilestedt is a centre-back, but she scored four goals in the tournament, all of which came from corners. Her goal-scoring contribution at the World Cup was absolutely incredible and even she was surprised to have scored two goals in the same game against Italy on the second day of the group stage.
“I don’t know what happened,” she laughed when speaking to MARCA before Sweden faced Spain in the semi-finals. “The important thing is that the team won.
“My role is not to score goals. Now I’m lucky enough to score them, but I’m just defending and helping the team however I can.”
“We do a lot of training on set pieces. When training sessions are over, we spend extra time training for corners.”
Gooners will be looking forward to seeing Amanda on the pitch for Arsenal over the coming weeks – she even has her own fan chant ready and waiting for her!
You can watch all 4 of Amanda’s goals on the FIFA website.
COYGW!
Michelle Maxwell
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