Sweden have beaten Paraguay 1-0 in their World Cup Group B encounter in Berlin on Thursday with an 89th minute goal from Arsenal’s Freddie Ljungberg.

Three free-kicks in as many minutes from Sweden in the opening period underlined the South Americans' desire to defend well and Kim Kallstrom wasted two of their opening chances from free-kicks by driving his set-pieces straight into the Paraguay wall.

Sweden had the majority of possession in the first-half, with Freddie Ljungberg having acres of space down the left.

His pass to Zlatan Ibrahimovic allowed the tall striker to lay in Henrik Larsson who failed to make a clean connection on his shot and the goalkeeper tidied up the loose ball easily.

As one would expect from two sides needing a win, the game was open and clear spaces were plentiful. Paraguay’s Nelson Valdez took advantage of some poor marking and Roque Santa Cruz's knock down allowed him a shot on goal, but neither side could find a breakthrough.

Valdez had a shot that he whacked well off-target, to the delight of the Swedes.

Christian Wilhelmsson and Freddie Ljungberg were given lods of space down the flanks, but couldn’t get the pass through to either Ibrahimovic or Larsson.

Nunez blasted a shot across goal in the 40th minute, which just needed a touch to be a goal, and on the break Sweden looked like scoring, but Zlatan Ibrahimovic had his tame shot easily saved by Aldo Bobadilla.

The game went into half-time 0-0, with Sweden looking the most likely to score, but neither side having carved any real chances.

Ibrahimovic, who had a lacklustre first-half, was substituted by Marcus Allback for the second-half, with Sweden trying to find an opener.

Paraguay's Julio Cesar Caceres then made an amazing goal-line clearance from Marcus Allback in the 58th minute.

Riveros was replaced by Julio Dos Santos in the 61st minute and Roque Santa Cruz for Dante Lopez two minutes afterwards showed head coach Anibal Ruiz’s determination to get a result.

But Sweden still had the better of the chances and came close again in the 67th minute when Henrik Larsson failed to get a cross from Allback on target.

Nelson and Valdez both had efforts that posed no problem for Andreas Isaksson in gola for the Swede’s.

Sweden kept pushing, with Allback making the difference to the Sweden attack, and come very close to scoring with just 10 minutes to go after Larsson crossed the ball to Allback who, with his back to goal, turned and shot, but was saved at close-range by Bobadilla.

Sweden kept pushing for the winner, but the vital spark was still missing from their attack and the Paraguay defence holding strong.

It was in the 88th minute that Sweden finally got the break, with Marcus Allback heading a cross across the penalty area, with Ljungberg heading in from close-range.

The Arsenal man almost doubled the lead in injury-time, but went-wide