Dominant first half sees Sweden beat Czechs to keep World Cup dream alive

[p]Bottom of Group H with one win from their first four matches, the match in Hovet was a must-win for [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/team/sweden/fuqXiPgO/"]Sweden[/a], who now go level with [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/team/czech-republic/nHbZvVnO/"]Czech Republic[/a] on seven points, one behind both [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/team/estonia/nsrT0eeP/"]Estonia[/a] and [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/team/slovenia/vHfUe4nd/"]Slovenia[/a], with three of the four going through to the second round.[/p][p]Sweden's points difference is better than the Czechs, but a 17-point win in Prague back in November keeps the central Europeans above the Scandinavians on head-to-head record.[/p][p]For a while in the Swedish capital, it looked as if [i]Blagult [/i]would do enough to overturn that deficit, as [b]the home side put up 34 points in the first quarter alone to open an 18-point lead, which they extended to a huge 61-35 at half-time[/b], with [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/player/klintman-bobi/nHnqbReL/"]Klintman[/a] in particular impressing on debut.[/p][embed guid="893ce19e-3672-4559-a8fa-3c4ec91c096b" url="https://x.com/FIBAWC/status/2073092505235570852" social-type="twitter" /][p]But Sweden couldn't maintain the tempo for all four quarters - [b]in the third, the Czechs cut the deficit by six, then limited their hosts to just eight points in the final 10 minutes.[/b] Sweden had done more than enough to take [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/game/basketball/czech-republic-nHbZvVnO/sweden-fuqXiPgO/?mid=0ALJPwa4"]the win[/a], but they remain outside the top three.[/p][p][a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/player/sehnal-ondrej/2cysW7Q3/"]Ondrej Sehnal[/a] top scored in the match with 20 points, one more than [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/player/larsson-pelle/tWlj30Aq/"]Larsson[/a] with Klintman - who led on rebounds with 12 - scoring 18 points.[/p][p]Sweden must now cause an upset by beating Slovenia in Ljubljana on Monday 6th July to have a chance of progressing, a tall order given the 11-point loss they suffered at home in the reverse fixture in December.[/p][p][b][a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/basketball/world/world-cup/"]Follow the 2027 FIBA World Cup qualifiers on Flashscore.[/a][/b][/p]