Vi gleder oss til fotballkampen.

We are looking forward to the football match.

Breakdown of Vi gleder oss til fotballkampen.

• vi: we
• oss: us
• glede seg til: to look forward to
• fotballkampen: the football match

Questions & Answers about Vi gleder oss til fotballkampen.

What does the phrase gleder oss mean, and why is oss used here?

“Glede seg” is a reflexive verb meaning “to look forward to” or “to be pleased about something.” The word oss is the first-person plural reflexive pronoun (“ourselves”), so gleder oss literally means “(we) rejoice ourselves,” i.e. “we look forward.”

What is the literal translation of Vi gleder oss til fotballkampen?

Literally it’s “We rejoice ourselves to the football match.” Idiomatically in English: “We are looking forward to the football match.”

What is the role of til in this sentence?

Here til is a preposition used with glede seg to introduce the thing you’re looking forward to. So gleder seg til noe = “to look forward to something.” It is not the infinitive marker “to” (as in “to do something”).

Why is fotballkampen written as one word and why does it end with -en?

Norwegian forms compound nouns by joining words: fotballkamp (“football match”). The suffix -en marks the definite form (“the football match”). So fotballkampen = “the football match.”

Can you turn this sentence into a yes/no question?

Yes—by inverting the verb and the subject:
Gleder vi oss til fotballkampen?
(“Are we looking forward to the football match?”)

Could you say the sentence without the reflexive pronoun oss?

No. Glede seg is inherently reflexive, so you need oss for “we.” Omitting it would leave the verb without its required reflexive object and sound incomplete.

Is there an alternative way to say “We look forward to the football match” in Norwegian?

Yes. You can use ser frem til:
Vi ser frem til fotballkampen.
This is a bit more formal than gleder oss til but means the same thing.

What is the basic word order in this sentence?

The pattern in a main clause is Subject – Verb – (Reflexive Pronoun) – Prepositional Phrase/Object.
Here:
Vi (Subject) – gleder (Verb) – oss (Reflexive Pronoun) – til fotballkampen (Prepositional Phrase).