Learn Hardcore Swedish: Han tror att gruppen lyckas bättre när alla har sovit bra. - He thinks that the group succeeds better when everyone has slept well.

tror = believe (think something is true, often without strong proof)
- Han tror att… = He believes that…
tycker = think / be of the opinion (often more personal, subjective opinions)
- Han tycker att filmen är bra. = He thinks the movie is good / He likes the movie.
tänker = think, be thinking (the mental process, or intend to do something)
- Han tänker på problemet. = He is thinking about the problem.
- Han tänker resa. = He plans/intends to travel.

In your sentence, he believes something about when the group does better, so tror is the natural verb. Using tycker here would sound more like “he has the opinion that,” which is possible but slightly different in nuance. Tänker would be wrong in this structure.

Why do we need att after tror? Could we say Han tror gruppen lyckas bättre…?

After verbs like tror, tycker, vet, Swedish normally uses att to introduce a subordinate clause:

Han tror att gruppen lyckas bättre…
Jag vet att du har rätt.
Hon säger att hon kommer.

In everyday spoken Swedish, att is often dropped, especially after tror and tycker:

Han tror (att) gruppen lyckas bättre…

But in standard writing and for learners, it’s safer to keep att.
So: Han tror gruppen lyckas bättre… (without att) is common in speech but looks informal or incomplete in writing.

Why is the word order att gruppen lyckas bättre and not att lyckas gruppen bättre?

In Swedish subordinate clauses introduced by att, the basic word order is:

[att] + subject + verb (+ other elements)

So:

att gruppen (subject) lyckas (verb) bättre (adverb)

You cannot use the “verb-second” (V2) main-clause order after att:

❌ att lyckas gruppen bättre (wrong)
✅ att gruppen lyckas bättre

Compare:

Main clause: Gruppen lyckas bättre. (subject–verb–adverb)
Sub clause: Han tror att gruppen lyckas bättre.

What exactly does lyckas mean, and why doesn’t it have an object?

Lyckas means “to succeed / to be successful / to manage”. It’s intransitive: it normally doesn’t take a direct object.

Gruppen lyckas. = The group succeeds / does well.
Han lyckas alltid. = He always succeeds.

To say what you succeed in, you add a phrase:

Gruppen lyckas bättre i matcherna.
The group does better in the matches.

In your sentence, lyckas bättre just says they succeed more / do better in general when everyone has slept well, so no object is needed.

Why is gruppen singular in form, but it refers to several people? Should the verb change?

In Swedish, gruppen (“the group”) is grammatically singular, just like in English:

gruppen lyckas (the group succeeds)
laget vinner (the team wins)

The verb lyckas has the same form for all persons and numbers, so it doesn’t change anyway:

Jag lyckas, du lyckas, han/hon lyckas, vi lyckas, de lyckas

So even though gruppen refers to many people, grammatically it’s one unit, so singular is correct: gruppen lyckas.

Why is it när and not om before alla har sovit bra?

Both när and om can translate to “when,” but they’re used differently:

när = when (at the time that / whenever)
Refers to an actual time or situation that does happen or is expected to happen.
om = if (sometimes “when” in the sense of if and when that happens)
Refers to a condition that might or might not happen.

In this sentence:

… när alla har sovit bra.
= … when / whenever everyone has slept well.

This describes a typical, real situation: whenever that condition is true, the group does better.
Using om (… om alla har sovit bra) would sound more like a hypothetical if and is less natural in this kind of general, habitual statement.

Why do we use har sovit and not just sov?

Har sovit is the present perfect (have slept):
har (have) + sovit (supine of sova).

The meaning here is: when everyone *has slept well (beforehand), the group does better. The sleeping is completed *before the success happens.

If you said:

… när alla sov bra.

This is past tense (“when everyone slept well”) and typically refers to a specific time in the past, not a general rule.

So the pattern is:

General rule / result depending on a completed earlier action:
Han tror att gruppen lyckas bättre när alla har sovit bra.
Story about the past:
Han trodde att gruppen lyckades bättre när alla sov bra.
(He thought the group did better when everyone slept well.)

Why is it har sovit and not something like har sovat? What is sovit?

In Swedish, with har (have) and hade (had), you don’t use the infinitive; you use the supine form.

For sova (to sleep):

Infinitive: att sova
Present: sover
Past (preterite): sov
Supine: sovit

The pattern in your sentence:

har (auxiliary) + sovit (supine) = har sovit (have slept)

So har sovat is incorrect; sovat is not a valid form. You must learn the supine as part of the verb’s principal parts.

Why is it bra and not väl, and can bra really mean “well”?

Yes, bra can mean both “good” and “well”, depending on context. In modern Swedish, bra is very common:

En bra bok. = A good book.
Hon sjunger bra. = She sings well.

Väl can also mean “well,” but:

It sounds more formal or old-fashioned in many contexts.
It often carries nuances like “surely / I suppose” when used as a particle:
Du kommer väl? = You’re coming, aren’t you?

In everyday Swedish, you would normally say:

Jag sov bra. = I slept well.

Jag sov väl is possible but sounds different (more like emphasis or a different tone).
So har sovit bra is the natural, modern choice.

What does bättre correspond to, and how is the comparative formed here?

Bättre is the comparative form of bra:

bra = good / well
bättre = better
bäst = best

So:

Gruppen lyckas bra. = The group does well.
Gruppen lyckas bättre. = The group does better / more successfully.

You don’t add -are here; bättre is an irregular comparative, just like English good → better.

Could we say Han tror gruppen kan lyckas bättre när alla har sovit bra? What difference would kan make?

You can say:

Han tror att gruppen kan lyckas bättre när alla har sovit bra.

Adding kan (can) changes the nuance:

lyckas bättre = does better / tends to do better (a general result)
kan lyckas bättre = can do better / has the possibility to do better

Your original sentence:

Han tror att gruppen lyckas bättre när alla har sovit bra.
= He believes that, as a rule, the group in fact does better when everyone has slept well.

With kan:

Han tror att gruppen kan lyckas bättre när alla har sovit bra.
= He believes that the group has the potential to do better when everyone has slept well.

Both are grammatically correct; which one you choose depends on whether you want to emphasize actual outcome (lyckas bättre) or possibility (kan lyckas bättre).