Norway women's national football team emerged in 1978 for the
Nordic Championship tournament, which was relatively early for Western Europe, but late for the
Nordic countries, beating only
Iceland. Having little culture for official clubs and a series system, Norway had a lot to do to catch up with neighboring
Sweden and
Denmark. Their early history therefore consisted of losing to their neighbors and eventually beating
Northern Ireland for their first win.
A power to be reckoned with Eventually, Norway's women's national football team rose in success throughout Europe, albeit not besting their Nordic neighbors. They beat
England,
France and
Switzerland. In the first
qualification for the
European Competition for Representative Women's Teams (later renamed UEFA Women's Championship), Norway played opposite Sweden,
Finland and Iceland. Norway lost both matches against Sweden, but beat Finland in both matches against them. A surprising home draw against Iceland mattered little, Norway took the second spot in a qualification where only the best teams qualified. Sweden later won the Euros.
The start of the golden years Norway seemed to have problems with Denmark, and they lost 0–5, their biggest loss at the time (if repeated later) shortly afterwards. Compared to other teams, however, Norway improved, and they beat Denmark and
West Germany in the
qualification for the
1987 Euros. The Euros, consisting as the men's
Euros had been until
1980 of two semi finals and a final played in one of the countries qualified for it. In this case, Norway was the host for the four matches. Norway beat
Italy in the semifinals and met Sweden in the finals. The finals was the first time Norway beat Sweden in a match, as Norway won 2–1. This made the national football team the first Norwegian sports team ever to have won anything, eleven years ahead of the
Norway women's national handball team. Norway continued to win the next year as they beat Sweden again in a final in
1988 FIFA Women's Invitation Tournament, in China. In the
1989 Euros Norway made the finals against West Germany, but this time lost 1–4. After that loss the coaches resigned, leaving the helm to
Even Pellerud. Pellerud saw Norway progress to the
1991 FIFA Women's World Cup. Before the first official world cup, Norway made it to the fourth (and Norway's third in a row) final of the Euros, where Norway again met Germany. Germany won in extra time. In the World cup Norway made it to the semifinals, where they lost to the
USA. Following that, Pellerud led the team to the
1993 Euros. Norway beat Denmark in the semifinals and Italy in the finals, winning their second Euros. Norway followed up with winning the
1994 Algarve Cup, the first ever to be arranged. The focus the next year was the
World Cup and its antecedent Euros, which also functioned as a qualifier for the World Cup. Norway met Italy already in the quarter-finals, and won it. Sweden managed to come back and thrash Norway in the second semifinal in Sweden, winning 5–7 after two matches. Norway was still qualified for the World Cup.
World Champions and beyond The 1995 World Cup in Sweden is part of Norwegian sports heritage. Norway won all their matches in the group stage, and continued to meet an unconvincing Denmark in the quarter-finals. Norway was up 3–0 with five minutes to go, and while conceding a goal a minute later, Norway was never threatened. The next encounter for Norway was the US, and in a close match, USA could never respond to an early goal by
Ann Kristin Aarønes, and the USA lost their first official international tournament. Norway met Germany in the finals. Having lost two Euro finals, Norway were not among the favourites, but they defeated Germany by two goals scored within the space of four minutes, becoming world champions. Pellerud resigned shortly afterwards. From the
first women's football in the Olympic Games, it was considered equal with the world cup in rank. Norway qualified as a matter of course because of their win in the World Cup. Norway drew with
Brazil, and beat Germany and Japan, proceeding to the semi-finals. There they lost to the US after extra time, but won the bronze medal after defeating Brazil. The 1997 Euros turned out to be a big disappointment for the ruling world champions at home, and Norway only made it to the semi-finals. This was the last time the two-year gap was used, making it easier to focus on the two competitions separately. Norway eased through to the
1999 FIFA Women's World Cup, where they beat all their opposition in the group stage. They met Sweden in the quarter-finals, proving that now Norway had the upper hand by beating them 3–1. Surprisingly, Norway lost heavily to
China, who won 5–0, thus equaling the embarrassment Sweden defeated Norway some 13 years earlier. In the bronze final, Norway lost to Brazil on penalties in front of a record 90,185 spectators. Before the 2000 Olympics, Norway set its own attendance record at
Ullevaal Stadium, when a crowd of 15,762 witnessed a 2–1 victory over the United States. Norway was not among the biggest favourites to win the
Sydney Olympics. They started off losing to the US, but picked up by beating Nigeria and China, the latter by one goal. In the semi-finals Norway beat Germany with a lucky own goal by
Tina Wunderlich after Germany pressed the Norwegians for the better part of the match. The final saw Norway against favourites USA in an even match.
Tiffeny Milbrett took the lead for the US, but Norway equaled the score by
Gro Espeseth and stayed in the game with a good keeper in
Bente Nordby. Norway took the lead in the match via a header by
Ragnhild Gulbrandsen, but Milbrett scored in stoppage time to prolong the match to extra time with
golden goal. Norway scored the winner in what seemed like a handball. The coach
Per-Mathias Høgmo quit after achieving this feat.
Decline Åge Steen took over as coach, but under his tutelage, things went from top to mediocre. In the
2001 Euros Norway's play was lackluster, and while making it to the semi-finals thanks to the France national team, Norway clearly lost to Germany. In the 2003 World Cup, Norway disappointed with a fumbling 1–4 to Brazil in the group stage before losing to USA in the quarter-finals. As Greece was arranging the
2004 Summer Olympics, there were only two additional spots for European teams, and Sweden and Germany, who had both proceeded to the finals, took them. Steen continued for another year, as stipulated by his contract, but was replaced in late 2004.
Brief recovery Under the new coach,
Bjarne Berntsen, Norway took things up a notch by reaching the final of the
2005 Euros with a classic 3–2 win over Sweden in extra time in the semifinal. Again Germany defeated Norway to win the championship. Norway continued to achieve reasonable results except in the Algarve Cup where the results started to slip. Despite this Norway qualified for the
2007 FIFA Women's World Cup in China. They drew with
Australia and narrowly beat
Canada, and then a 7–2 win over
Ghana took them to the top of their group. Norway then progressed further by beating China 1–0, but lost 0–3 to Germany in the semifinal. In the bronze final Norway lost 1–4 to the US to finish in fourth place in the World Cup, which qualified them to enter the
Beijing Olympics. Norway's top scorer
Ragnhild Gulbrandsen was awarded the
Bronze Boot behind
Marta of Brazil and
Abby Wambach of the United States. From there Berntsen's fortunes began to wane. First he was criticized for telling
Lise Klaveness she had no future in the national team under him, at 1a.m. at Oslo airport as they were arriving back from China, a gross error that he later admitted. Then in the 2008 Olympics Norway first impressively beat USA, then lost to Japan 1–5 and went out in the quarter-finals against Brazil. In October 2008, five players refused to play in the National Team, making comments that implied playing under Berntsen was too much of a burden, which led to a media outcry. With a reduced team, and also after some less controversial resignations, Norway produced a relatively good result at the
2009 UEFA Women's Championship by beating Sweden 3–1 in the quarter-finals, even with an embarrassing 0–4 against Germany and a modest 1–0 against Iceland and 1–1 against France. After the championship, Berntsen's contract ended.
Landsem Eli Landsem, the first woman coach and the first coach with experience of coaching women's football, took over at the end of 2009. Under her some of the players who had previously elected not to play returned. Landsem produced acceptable results and the team qualified to play in the
2011 FIFA World Cup after winning all but one of the matches in their
qualification group. However Norway failed to reach the quarter-finals for the first time in its history after losing to Brazil (0–3) and
Australia (1–2). As a result, they also failed to qualify for the
2012 Summer Olympics. The next task was qualification to the
2013 European Cup competition, with Norway in Group3 with
Iceland,
Northern Ireland,
Belgium,
Hungary and
Bulgaria. The campaign began badly with 3–1 losses to Iceland and 64th-ranked Northern Ireland, but in 2012 the position was recovered with wins in the last six matches, and Norway finished top of Group3 with eight wins from ten matches. They later went on to finish as runners-up in
the finals in Sweden.
Struggle At the
2015 FIFA Women's World Cup, Norway was drawn into a group with
Germany,
Thailand and the
Ivory Coast. Norway performed well in the group stage, as the team beat Thailand 4–0 and the Ivory Coast 3–1. They drew 1–1 against former champions Germany. Norway would lose 2–1 in the round of sixteen to England. England went on to win the bronze medal.
2016–2018 On 16 December 2016
Martin Sjögren was introduced as the new coach of Norway. He had previous coaching experience in the
Damallsvenskan with
Linköpings and
LdB FC Malmö. Norway qualified for
Euro 2017 without losing a game. They were drawn into Group A alongside the
Netherlands,
Belgium and
Denmark. Norway was the highest ranked team in Group A, and were predicted by many to win the group. They ended up being one of the biggest disappointments of the tournament as they lost all three group games without scoring a goal. On 9 September 2017 Norway striker and 2016
UEFA Women's Player of the Year Ada Hegerberg announced she was taking a break from international duty, and was unsure when or if she would return. On 7 October 2017 the
Norway Football Association announced that Norway's male and female players would receive equal financial compensation, with the men making a contribution to the women's team. This equalled nearly a fifty percent increase in compensation for the women. On 4 September 2018 Norway defeated the
Netherlands 2–1 in their final group game of
UEFA World Cup Qualifying. As a result, Norway won qualifying Group3 and secured an automatic berth in the
2019 World Cup, while the
Netherlands who won
Euro 2017 were forced to go to the play-off.
Euro 2022 In their
Euro 2022 group stage match against England, the host country of the competition and eventual champions, on 11 July 2022, the team suffered their biggest defeat, losing 8–0. Norway was eliminated after the first round, as in
2017, after losing the final Group A match against
Austria (0–1), having won only one match, in the opening match against
Northern Ireland (4–1).
2023 World Cup The
2023 World Cup is also a difficult one for Norway, who initially took a scare by being provisionally bottom of their group after 2 matchdays, following a surprise defeat by hosts
New Zealand, who had never before won a match in a World Cup finals (0–1) despite a late penalty miss by New Zealand, followed by a goalless draw with
Switzerland (0–0). Norway, who failed to score in their first two matches, managed to qualify by finishing 2nd in their group thanks to a comprehensive 6–0 victory over the
Philippines, who were new to the competition, beating
New Zealand on overall goal difference, who also had 4 points. As in
2015, the Scandinavians were eliminated in the Round of 16 by
Japan (1–3). ==All-time record==