Football Season Guide

Created as recently as 2010 Dalkurd wrote new page in their short history last season when finishing in second place in the Second Tier and as a result earning the right to enjoy their first ever top flight campaign. Very surprisingly though the manager left at the end of the season and Dalkurd’s Board decided to trust a strange choice as a coach for their first ever Allsvenskan campaign. Azrudin Valentic was appointed in charge, in 2017 he was Brommapojkarna’s assistant coach, the only team finishing above Dalkurd in their division, and according to many he was the mastermind behind his ex-team’s rise. Valentic knew that forced changes to the line-up will have to be made as such a successful season attracted attention and four regulars departed this winter. Particularly in two defensive areas rebuilding was needed. Dalkurd lost both of their goalkeepers and the two left-backs, but they signed two new players for each of these positions and hopes are that this will plug the holes. Probably the most notable winter arrival so far is that of striker Marzouk, with the 22-year-old Moroccan tipped to lead the attack and expected to play a key role for the team. Awad is the other usual starter up front, that if Dalkurd go for two forwards this season, but the American Stadler had some key contributions off the bench last season with his crucial late goals. All this suggests that Dalkurd could cause damage if the service for the forwards is good enough. Dalkurd are using both 4-4-2 and 4-2-3-1 a lot, but in the Swedish Cup games played in March they were also seen trusting a formation with five at the back and this is a suggestion that against the top sides this might be the preferred approach. The main worry for most pundits is that Dalkurd have only two typical wide midfielders in their ranks, Rashidi and newcomer Ayaz, which suggests that the main tactics will be to try and penetrate through the middle more.