Allsvenskan

Websiteallsvenskan.se (in Swedish)Current: 2024 Allsvenskan

Swedish football league structure
Allsvenskan (Tier 1)
Superettan (Tier 2)
Ettan (Tier 3)
Division 2 (Tier 4)
Division 3 (Tier 5)
Division 4 (Tier 6)
Division 5 (Tier 7)
Division 6 (Tier 8)
Division 7 (Tier 9)
Division 8 (Tier 10)

Allsvenskan (Swedish pronunciation: [ˈâlːˌsvɛnːskan]; English: the All-Swedish, also known as Fotbollsallsvenskan [ˈfûːtbɔlsˌalːsvɛnskan], English: the Football All-Swedish) is a Swedish professional league for men's association football clubs. It was founded in 1924 and is the top tier of the Swedish football league system, operating on a system of promotion and relegation with Superettan. Seasons run from late March or early April to the beginning of November, with the 16 clubs all meeting each other twice, resulting in a 30-match season, for a total of 240 matches league-wide.

Allsvenskan is ranked 23rd in the UEFA coefficients of leagues based on performances in European competitions over the last five years. Allsvenskan is currently ranked third highest of the leagues in Scandinavia after Norway and Denmark. The current champions are Malmö FF, who won the title in the 2023 season.

The three teams with most Swedish championships are Malmö FF (23), IFK Göteborg (18) and IFK Norrköping (13).

Including the 2023 season, Allsvenskan has been running for an unbroken streak of 99 seasons^[update]. Unlike other European football leagues, the Allsvenskan did not experience an interruption in play during World War II due to Swedish neutrality.

History

Allsvenskan started in the 1924–25 Allsvenskan season and the first winner was GAIS. The one-league twelve team Allsvenskan replaced the Svenska Serien, consisting of a southern and northern group that was held before. In 1931, the league started to decide the Swedish football champions.

In the early years, Norrland and Gotland teams were not allowed to play on higher levels in the league system, which was gradually changed to include the Norrland and Gotland teams on higher levels.

For the 1959 Allsvenskan, the season start was changed from autumn to spring to be played in one calendar year. In 1973, it was expanded to contain 14 teams. In the 1970s, Malmö FF, under the lead of Spanish Antonio Durán and later English Bob Houghton, won five Allsvenskan and managed to proceed to the 1979 European Cup Final, which they lost to Nottingham Forest.

From the 1982 season, the league introduced a play-off to determine the Swedish football champions. In the late 1980s, Malmö FF were dominant, winning the league five times in a row, but only two Swedish championships. The 1990 season saw the introduction of three points per win. The play-off season years were followed by two years of continuation league, named Mästerskapsserien.

The 1993 season saw a return to the classical format, again with 14 teams. IFK Göteborg won five Allsvenskan league titles in the 1990s.

In the early 2000s, Djurgårdens IF won three titles (2002, 2003 and 2005). In 2004, Örebro SK lost its place in the league due to financial problems, and Assyriska FF got their place. Since 2008, the league consists of 16 teams.

Status

The champions are considered Swedish champions and gold medal winners. The runners-up are awarded the Large Silver medal, the third positioned team are awarded the Small Silver medal and the team positioned in fourth place are awarded the Bronze medal.

There have been seasons with exceptions when the winners of Allsvenskan wasn't considered Swedish champions as well. Allsvenskan winners between 1924 and 1930 were crowned league champions and awarded gold medals, the title of Swedish champions was awarded to the winner of Svenska Mästerskapet up until 1925 and then not at all until 1930. The years 1982 through 1990 are also exceptions, the title was instead decided through play-offs during these years. The same was true for the years 1991 and 1992 when the title was decided through a continuation league called Mästerskapsserien. Historically, however, there is a big difference between the Allsvenskan winners before 1931 compared to the period between 1982 and 1992. As winning Allsvenskan in its earlier seasons was the optimal aim for the clubs, while as during the era of play-offs and Mästerskapsserien, the optimal goal wasn't to win Allsvenskan, but the play-offs or Mästerskapsserien.

Competition format

Since 2008 there are 16 clubs in Allsvenskan. During the course of a season (starting in late March and ending in early November) each club plays the others twice (home and away) for a total of 30 games. The two lowest placed teams at the end of the season are relegated to Superettan and the top two teams from Superettan are promoted in their place. The third lowest team in Allsvenskan plays a relegation/promotion play-off against the third placed team in Superettan.

The winners of Allsvenskan qualify for the UEFA Champions League, the runner-up together with the third placed team in the table qualify for the UEFA Europa League as well as the team who wins the Svenska Cupen. In case the winner of the Cup has already qualified to Champions League or Europa League, the third Europa League spot is given to the team that finishes fourth in Allsvenskan.

Changes in competition format

From	To	Teams	Match-weeks	Season Start	Season End	Play-offs
1924–25	1956–57	12	22	Autumn	Spring	—
1957–58			33		Next autumn	—
1959	1972		22	Spring	Autumn	—
1973	1981	14	26			—
1982	1983	12	22			Play-offs with eight teams
1984	1990					Play-offs with four teams
1991	1992	10	18		Summer	League with six teams
1993	2007	14	26		Autumn	—
2008	Present	16	30			—

The decider at equal number of points was goal ratio until the 1940–41 season, thereafter goal difference.

Awards

Trophy

The current trophy awarded to the Swedish champions is the Lennart Johanssons Pokal. Created in 2001, the trophy is named after former UEFA chairman, Lennart Johansson. A different trophy that was named after Clarence von Rosen, the first chairman of the Swedish Football Association, had previously been used between 1903 and 2000, but was replaced after journalists reported that von Rosen had personal connections to the later infamous Nazi leader Hermann Göring during the time he lived in Sweden (soon after World War One).^[1] The former President of the Swedish Football Association, Lars-Åke Lagrell stated that the reason for the change of trophy was not a personal attack against Von Rosen but rather that the Football Association did not want to be linked to Nazism and constantly engage in discussions regarding this every time the trophy was awarded.^[1]

Player and manager awards

In addition to the winner's trophy and the individual winner's medals awarded to players, Allsvenskan also awards the most valuable player, goalkeeper of the year, defender of the year, midfielder of the year, forward of the year, newcomer of the year and manager of year at Allsvenskans stora pris together with C More and Magasinet Offside.^[2] Also, the Allsvenskan top scorer is awarded.

Television

Sweden

The Swiss corporation Kentaro has owned the TV rights for Allsvenskan since 2006.^[3] Through licence agreements with the media company TV4 Group matches are aired through C More Entertainment who broadcasts them on their C More Sport and C More Live channels, until 2019. Matches can also be bought through the online pay-per-view service C SPORTS.^[4]

On 24 March 2017, Discovery-owned channel Eurosport and OTT streaming service dPlay will be the new domestic broadcaster for both SEF competitions (Allsvenskan and Superettan) effectively from 2020 until 2025, as well as selected European countries (exc. Italy) for Allsvenskan.^[5]

International

Beginning in 2018, Allsvenskan matches were previously broadcast in the UK on Premier Sports and FreeSports.^[6] In October 2018, ESPN picked up the rights to broadcast one Allsvenskan match per week in the United States.^[7] Allsvenskan matches have also been broadcast in several countries, such as DAZN in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland, Sport Klub in Balkan countries,^[8] Nova sports in Cyprus and Greece, TV2 in Norway^[9] and 4th Sports in Iraq^[10]

Current broadcast rights

Region	Broadcaster
Sweden	Eurosport, Discovery+
Bosnia and Herzegovina	Sport Klub
Croatia
Montenegro
North Macedonia
Serbia
Slovenia
Finland	Eurosport
France
Greece
Romania
Spain
Hong Kong	TVB
Iceland	NENT
Iraq	4th Sports
Italy	Sportitalia
United Kingdom	LiveScore

Clubs

A total of 67 clubs have played in Allsvenskan from its inception in 1924 up to and including the 2023 season. No club has been a member of the league for every season since its inception. AIK is the club that has participated in the most seasons, with a record of 96 out of 100 seasons in total. Malmö FF has the record for most consecutive seasons: 63 between 1936–37 and 1999. IFK Göteborg is currently the club with the longest running streak, starting their 48th season in 2024.

The following 16 clubs are competing in Allsvenskan during the 2024 season:

Club	Position in 2023	First season	Number of seasons	First season of current spell	Titles	Last title
AIK	11th	1924–25	96	2006	6	2018
BK Häcken	3rd	1983	24	2009	1	2022
Djurgårdens IF	4th	1927–28	69	2001	8	2019
GAIS	2nd in Superettan	1924–25	55	2024	4	1953–54
Halmstads BK	12th	1933	57	2023	4	2000
Hammarby IF	7th	1924–25	56	2015	1	2001
IF Brommapojkarna	14th	2007	8	2023	0	—
IF Elfsborg	2nd	1926–27	81	1997	6	2012
IFK Göteborg	13th	1924–25	92	1977	13	2007
IFK Norrköping	9th	1924–25	84	2011	13	2015
IFK Värnamo	5th	2022	3	2022	0	—
IK Sirius	8th	1969	11	2017	0	—
Kalmar FF	6th	1949–50	37	2004	1	2008
Malmö FF	1st	1931–32	89	2001	26	2023
Mjällby AIF	10th	1980	13	2020	0	—
Västerås SK	1st in Superettan	1955–56	5	2024	0	—

Stadiums and locations

Team	Location	Stadium	Turf	Stadium capacity
AIK	Solna	Friends Arena	Natural	50,000
BK Häcken	Gothenburg	Bravida Arena	Artificial	6,316
Djurgårdens IF	Stockholm	Tele2 Arena	Artificial	30,000
GAIS	Gothenburg	Gamla Ullevi	Natural	18,454
Halmstads BK	Halmstad	Örjans Vall	Natural	10,873
Hammarby IF	Stockholm	Tele2 Arena	Artificial	30,000
IF Brommapojkarna	Stockholm	Grimsta IP	Artificial	5,000
IF Elfsborg	Borås	Borås Arena	Artificial	16,200
IFK Göteborg	Gothenburg	Gamla Ullevi	Natural	18,454
IFK Norrköping	Norrköping	Nya Parken[note 1]	Artificial	16,000
IFK Värnamo	Värnamo	Finnvedsvallen	Natural	5,000
IK Sirius	Uppsala	Studenternas IP	Artificial	10,522
Kalmar FF	Kalmar	Guldfågeln Arena	Natural	12,182
Malmö FF	Malmö	Stadion[note 2]	Natural	22,500
Mjällby AIF	Hällevik	Strandvallen	Natural	7,500
Västerås SK	Västerås	Hitachi Energy Arena	Artificial	7,044

Managers

The current managers in Allsvenskan are:

	Name	Club	Appointed
	Henning Berg	AIK	2 July 2023
	Pål Arne Johansen	BK Häcken	27 December 2023
	Kim Bergstrand Thomas Lagerlöf	Djurgårdens IF	16 November 2018
	Fredrik Holmberg	GAIS	9 November 2021
	Magnus Haglund	Halmstads BK	7 May 2019
	Kim Hellberg	Hammarby IF	14 December 2023
	Andreas Engelmark Olof Mellberg	IF Brommapojkarna	5 December 2022
	Jimmy Thelin	IF Elfsborg	6 December 2017
	Jens Berthel Askou	IFK Göteborg	7 June 2023
	Andreas Alm	IFK Norrköping	29 December 2023
	Anes Mravac	IFK Värnamo	17 November 2023
	Christer Mattiasson	IK Sirius	5 December 2022
	Henrik Jensen	Kalmar FF	28 December 2022
	Henrik Rydström	Malmö FF	17 November 2022
	Anders Torstensson	Mjällby AIF	14 November 2022
	Kalle Karlsson	Västerås SK	2 August 2021

Players

Rank	Player	Apps	Goals
1	Sven Andersson	431	0
2	Andreas Johansson	428	20
3	Thomas Ravelli	416	0
4	Daniel Tjernström	411	24
5	Sven Jonasson	410	254

Appearances

Sven Andersson has the record for most appearances in Allsvenskan with 431 appearances for Örgryte IS and Helsingborgs IF. Sven Jonasson has the record for most matches in a row with 332 matches for IF Elfsborg between 11 September 1927 and 1 November 1942.

Foreign players

Until 1974, foreign players were banned from playing in Allsvenskan, however not on all levels of football in Sweden.^[11] In the first season of allowance, on 13 April 1974, English Ronald Powell in Brynäs IF became the first foreign player in Allsvenskan^[11] In 1977, Tunisian Melke Amri became the first non-European player. In 1978, Icelandic Teitur Þórðarson in Östers IF became the first foreign player to win the Allsvenskan^[12]

Rank	Player	Apps	Goals
1	Sven Jonasson	410	254
2	Carl-Erik Holmberg	260	194
3	Filip Johansson	181	180
4	Harry Lundahl	176	179
5	Harry Bild	288	162
	Bertil Johansson	267	162

Top scorers

Sven Jonasson has scored the most goals in Allsvenskan history, with 254 goals in 410 appearances. Gunnar Nordahl has become the top scorer most times, with four wins.

Previous winners

Note that this list does not necessarily equate to the Swedish champions, as a play-off format was used in the 1980's. For a comprehensive list of Swedish football champions, see: List of Swedish football champions

Key

0000000000	Season when the league didn't decide the Swedish champions
0000000000	Season when Swedish champions wasn't awarded at all

Performances

Medal table

Historically the players and coaching staff from the four best teams in Allsvenskan are awarded medals at the end of each season. The champions are awarded the gold medal while the runners-up receive the "big silver" medal. The third place team gets the "small silver" medal instead of the more commonly used bronze medal which is instead awarded to the fourth-place finisher. This tradition of awarding four medals and not three is thought to have to do with the fact that the losers of the Semi-finals of Svenska Mästerskapet were both given bronze medals since no bronze match was played.^[13]

The overall medal rank is displayed below after points in descending order. 5 points are awarded for a "gold" medal, 3 points for a "big silver" medal, 2 points for a "small silver" medal and 1 point for a bronze medal. The table that follows is accurate as of the end of the 2023 season.^[13][14][15]

Rank	Club	Gold	Big Silver	Small Silver	Bronze	Points
1	Malmö FF	26	15	10	8	203
2	IFK Göteborg	13	13	16	10	146
3	IFK Norrköping	13	10	5	8	113
4	AIK	6	15	12	8	107
5	Helsingborgs IF	7	8	8	10	85
6	Djurgårdens IF	8	4	11	5	79
7	IF Elfsborg	6	8	6	9	75
8	GAIS	4	4	4	4	44
9	Östers IF	4	3	3	3	38
10	Örgryte IS	2	2	6	6	34
11	Halmstads BK	4	2	2	2	32
12	Hammarby IF	1	2	4	3	22
13	Kalmar FF	1	2	2	4	19
14	Åtvidabergs FF	2	2	-	1	17
15	Örebro SK	-	2	2	4	14
16	BK Häcken	1	1	2	1	13
17	Degerfors IF	-	2	2	2	12
18	IK Sleipner	1	1	1	1	11
19	Landskrona BoIS	-	-	1	3	5
	Sandvikens IF	-	-	1	3	5
21	IFK Malmö	-	1	-	-	3
	Jönköpings Södra IF	-	1	-	-	3
	Råå IF	-	1	-	-	3
24	Trelleborgs FF	-	-	1	1	3
25	IK Brage	-	-	-	3	3

Honoured clubs

Clubs in European football are commonly honoured for winning multiple league titles and a representative golden star is sometimes placed above the club badge to indicate the club having won 10 league titles. In Sweden the star instead symbolizes 10 Swedish championship titles for the majority of the clubs as the league winner has not always been awarded the title of Swedish champions.^[a] Stars for Allsvenskan clubs was not common practise until 2006, although AIK had already introduced a star to their kit in 2000. IFK Göteborg, Malmö FF, IFK Norrköping, Örgryte IS and Djurgårdens IF were the first teams after AIK to introduce their stars. No new club has introduced a star since 2006, the clubs closest to their first are IF Elfsborg with 6 Swedish championship titles and Helsingborgs IF with 7 Allsvenskan titles depending on what the star symbolizes. The following table is ordered after number of stars followed by number of Swedish championship titles and then the number of Allsvenskan titles.

Statistics updated as of the end of the 2021 season

Club	Swedish championship titles	Allsvenskan titles	Stars	Introduced
Malmö FF	23	26		2006
IFK Göteborg	18	13		2006
IFK Norrköping	13	13		2006
AIK	12	6		2000
Djurgårdens IF	12	8		2006
Örgryte IS	12	2		2006

Cities

Town or city	League wins	Clubs
Malmö	26	Malmö FF (26)
Gothenburg	20	IFK Göteborg (13), GAIS (4), Örgryte IS (2), BK Häcken (1)
Stockholm	15	Djurgårdens IF (8), AIK (6), Hammarby IF (1)
Norrköping	14	IFK Norrköping (13), IK Sleipner (1)
Helsingborg	7	Helsingborgs IF (7)
Borås	6	IF Elfsborg (6)
Halmstad	4	Halmstads BK (4)
Växjö	4	Östers IF (4)
Åtvidaberg	2	Åtvidabergs FF (2)
Kalmar	1	Kalmar FF (1)

All-time Allsvenskan table

The all-time Allsvenskan table, "maratontabellen" in Swedish, is a cumulative record of all match results, points, and goals of every team that has played in Allsvenskan since its inception in 1924–25. It uses three points for a win even though this system was not introduced until the 1990 season. The matches played in the championship play-offs between 1982 and 1990 or the matches played in Mästerskapsserien in 1991 and 1992 are not included. The table that follows is accurate as of the end of the 2023 season.^[17]

Malmö FF are the current leaders, having had the lead since the end of the 2012 season when they overtook the lead from IFK Göteborg. IFK Göteborg are the club to have spent most seasons in the top spot with 48 seasons as leaders with a record of the most consecutive seasons as leaders with 35 seasons between 1938 and 1972. Six clubs have been in the lead, the lead having changed among them ten times since 1925. The former leader with the lowest current ranking in the table is GAIS, currently placing 12th and 2120 points short of Malmö FF.

A total of 67 clubs have played at least one season at Allsvenskan up to and including 2023 season.

Statistics

UEFA coefficients

The following data indicates Swedish coefficient rankings between European football leagues.^[18]

Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.

Attendance

Last five seasons average attendance

Year	Spectators per match
2016	9,127
2017	9,215
2018	8,423
2019	9,166
2020	N/A
2021	N/A
2022	9,958

The record for highest average home attendance for a club was set by Hammarby in 2022 (26,372 over 15 home matches). Most other attendance records for Allsvenskan were set in the 1959 season, coinciding with the first season that the league switched from an autumn–spring format to a spring–autumn format. 1959 saw records for highest attendance at a match (52,194 at an Örgryte win over IFK Göteborg at Ullevi), second highest average home attendance for a club (25,490 for Örgryte's 11 home matches), and the highest ever average attendance for Allsvenskan as a whole (13,369).

In the past, AIK had the league's highest attendance for the season more often than any other club, followed by IFK Göteborg and Örgryte. However, for the past two decades, Hammarby has dominated the attendance figures helped by a move to the larger Tele2 Arena from the much smaller Söderstadion. Other teams that have for at least one season had the best attendance in the league include Helsingborg, Malmö FF, Djurgården, GAIS, Örebro SK and Öster.

Referees

Allsvenskan has 23 active referees that are available for matches as of the 2020 season. Currently there are seven fully certified international FIFA referees in Allsvenskan. There are also a further twelve referees who are certified by the Swedish Football Association who have refereed matches in Allsvenskan. A further four referees certified by the Swedish Football Association are available to referee Allsvenskan matches but have not done so as of 2020.^[21]

FIFA certified referees

• Mohammed Al-Hakim
• Andreas Ekberg
• Kristoffer Karlsson
• Glenn Nyberg
• Bojan Pandžić
• Martin Strömbergsson
• Kaspar Sjöberg

Allsvenskan in international competition

Malmö FF were runners up in the 1978–79 European Cup, after a 1–0 defeat against Nottingham Forest.^[22] IFK Göteborg won the UEFA Cup twice, in 1981–82 (defeating Hamburger SV in the finals)^[23] and 1986–87 (defeating Dundee United in the finals).^[24] IFK Göteborg also reached the semi-finals of the European Cup in 1985–86. They won 3–0 against FC Barcelona, and lost 0–3 at Camp Nou, Barcelona won on penalty shootout.^[25]

The following teams have participated in UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League or UEFA Europa Conference League group stages:

Club	UEFA Champions League	UEFA Europa League	UEFA Conference League
IFK Göteborg	1992–93 (SF) 1994–95 (QF) 1996–97 (GS) 1997–98 (GS)	—
Malmö FF	2014–15 (GS) 2015–16 (GS) 2021–22 (GS)	2011–12 (GS) 2018–19 (R32) 2019–20 (R32) 2022–23 (GS)
Helsingborgs IF	2000–01 (GS)	2007–08 (R32) 2012–13 (GS)
AIK	1999–2000 (GS)	2012–13 (GS)
IF Elfsborg	—	2007–08 (GS) 2013–14 (GS)
BK Häcken	—	2023–24 (GS)
Halmstads BK	—	2005–06 (GS)
Östersunds FK	—	2017–18 (R32)
Djurgårdens IF Fotboll	—	—	2022–23 (R16)

See also

• Damallsvenskan
• List of Allsvenskan top scorers
• List of foreign Allsvenskan players
• Seasons in Swedish football
• Sports attendances

Footnotes

References

External links

• Official Allsvenskan website
• Allsvenskan at the Swedish Football Association website