Mikeyg: We never had a anti-nylander agenda in Sweden, not sure about what's going on in Canada though, what are you referring too?
William is a true celebrated star in Sweden now and Leafs is a popular team too because of our legends Salming and Sundin playing for Toronto many years. It's fun witnessing the raise of the Leafs and it may be a cup winning team pretty soon. Extremely frustrating that neither Salming and Sundin won a cup... it hurts and this fact may have caused some frustrations in Sweden vs the Leafs with me being one of them.
Personally I follow my favorite Swedish players in the NHL but I care less about the actual teams. It's fun with classical teams like the Oilers and Leafs finally starting to look good again.
People in Sweden not liking William or questioning his talent was very, very rare before WC and is probably super rare now. Only question mark for me was his strength and the physical aspects of the game but it looks like William is working really hard during the off-seasons and looking better year after year. Considering his age he is simply great.
The funniest thing about the young Nylanders though is that little brother Alexander may very well turning out being the best one in the long run, looking extremely promising. Only negative so far is his last poor season in AHL but the entire Rochester team played terrible. It will be fun when both the Nylanders are playing for Sweden.
Alex Nylander
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Mj-DEqm9cE
Alex is slightly taller/bigger and arguably have a harder shot than William at the same age. Alex is looking a bit more like a true sniper though and could be a more selfish type of player comparing to William, we will have to wait and see.