Marked for Marcus Rohdén
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match31 Oct 2026
7 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
At 35 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.10, and nobody on the pitch better.
Market2 Nov 2026
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at IF Elfsborg is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The terraces2 Nov 2026
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Ninety minutes of Taylor Silverholt at his very best
Marked 8.56. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at IF Elfsborg.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
A performance of 8.49 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Match31 Oct 2026
IF Elfsborg rescue it on 87 minutes
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 87. IFK Goteborg had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Marcus Rohdén slips down the pecking order
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Marcus Rohdén is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
Match31 Oct 2026
It needed Taylor Silverholt to find the net to bring anything home at all: 3‑3 against IFK Goteborg, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match22 Oct 2026
A European night to remember for IF Elfsborg
2‑2 against Zulte Waregem, under lights, against people who do not speak the same language as the crowd. These are the evenings a club measures its decade in, and there are never as many of them as anybody expects.
Match22 Oct 2026
A 2-goal lead gone for IF Elfsborg
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Zulte Waregem kept coming because nothing stopped them, and IF Elfsborg will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Match25 Oct 2026
6 matches without a win for IF Elfsborg
The run now stands at 6, and the questions being asked around IF Elfsborg are no longer polite ones.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Thomas Isherwood and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
A performance of 8.27 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 18. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Ninety minutes of Taylor Silverholt at his very best
Marked 8.02. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at IF Elfsborg.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at IF Elfsborg pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market19 Oct 2026
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Isak Pettersson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around IF Elfsborg the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Match17 Oct 2026
4 matches without a win for IF Elfsborg
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around IF Elfsborg are no longer polite ones.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Time is catching up with Niklas Hult
Everybody at IF Elfsborg saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 36 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Dion Krasniqi
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Isak Pettersson is on it.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Arbër Zeneli knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Arbër Zeneli trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Erik Ekdal chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Chances created: 10. Somebody has to open a door before anybody can walk through it, and he spent the afternoon opening doors.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 12. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match1 Oct 2026
IF Elfsborg do the business in Europe
0‑0. Continental football is where a club finds out what it actually is, and IF Elfsborg came through the finding-out well against NEC.
Market5 Oct 2026
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at IF Elfsborg is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Jon Esenga is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Match4 Oct 2026
BK Hacken left with the points after a 1‑3 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Loan watch5 Oct 2026
“I watch every IF Elfsborg game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at SJK runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑3 defeat, delivered by Erik Ekdal to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
Marcus Rohdén dropped after a run of poor form
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad28 Sep 2026
The step up is real for Leo Östman
At 20 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Simon Olsson was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.24. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match26 Sep 2026
IF Elfsborg hit back inside 4 minutes
Falkenberg held the lead for 4 minutes, which is not long enough to enjoy it. IF Elfsborg answered before the celebration had properly finished, and the shape of the afternoon changed with it.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Isak Pettersson
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
Rasmus Wikström has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at IF Elfsborg will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Match26 Sep 2026
A 1‑1 draw with Falkenberg leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
Simon Hedlund dropped after a run of poor form
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Erik Ekdal was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the IF Elfsborg dressing room was either.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match17 Sep 2026
IF Elfsborg do the business in Europe
1‑1. Continental football is where a club finds out what it actually is, and IF Elfsborg came through the finding-out well against Lech.
Market21 Sep 2026
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Isak Pettersson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around IF Elfsborg the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Per Frick, 34, rolls back the years — 8.38
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.38 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Sebastian Holmén was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match20 Sep 2026
It finished 2‑0, and it was Frederik Ihler’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to IF Elfsborg.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Marked 8.50 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Ninety minutes of Taylor Silverholt at his very best
Marked 8.00. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at IF Elfsborg.
Match17 Sep 2026
IF Elfsborg rescue it on 87 minutes
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 87. Lech had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Ari Sigurpálsson will call it something else in private.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
The terraces31 Aug 2026
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Match29 Aug 2026
A 1‑0 win over AIK, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
The window shuts on the Jakob Kindberg deal
IF Elfsborg ran out of time with Kalmar FF. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Marked 7.86 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, IF Elfsborg had the best player on the pitch.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Erik Ekdal on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
Simon Hedlund dropped after a run of poor form
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nils Roström, and the manager let it.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 13. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad31 Aug 2026
One yellow too many, and a match watched from the stand. The most avoidable absence in football, and IF Elfsborg will feel it on Saturday.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
The offer went to Bodo/Glimt this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Market10 Aug 2026
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” FC Lahti had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Age has not caught Marcus Rohdén yet — 7.83
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.83 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
IF Elfsborg asked and Hammarby said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Market10 Aug 2026
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Lucas Hägg Johansson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around IF Elfsborg the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Boardroom10 Aug 2026
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $85.0K — a club that wants Christ Wawa enough to be asked twice.
Boardroom10 Aug 2026
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Lucas Hägg Johansson has agreed terms with Hammarby for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Rasmus Wikström commits to IF Elfsborg for another 4 years.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
$83.0K on the table at BK Hacken. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.