Marta inspires Brazil women to 5-1 win over Sweden in Rio Olympics

Brazil's women pulled off a stunning 5-1 win over Sweden to seal their place in the quarter-finals of the Olympic football competition.

Their male counterparts were held to a disappointing 0-0 draw by South Africa earlier, but the women gave the host nation a huge lift with a brilliant performance over a team ranked two places above them - in sixth - in the world rankings.

Star of the show was Marta, whose sublime skills had the 43,000 fans present chanting "Marta is better than Neymar".

Barcelona forward Neymar carries the hopes of the home nation on his shoulders in the men's competition.

"We know Neymar is our best player right now and he is fantastic, we support him and he supports us but we'll leave the comparison to the fans," Marta said. "We have Marta, we have Neymar, we have Cristiane, we're all Brazilian."

Brazil - who beat China 3-0 in their first game - opened the scoring through Beatriz after 21 minutes when she ran through on goal, outmuscled a defender and poked the ball home.

Sweden had a goal disallowed shortly after then fell 2-0 behind in 24 minutes when Marta crossed the ball along the six-yard box and Cristiane's clever flick took a deflection on its way to the net.

Marta got the third from the penalty spot just seconds before half time and then scored Brazil's fourth with 10 minutes remaining when she slotted home from eight yards after playing a fortunate one-two off a Swedish defender.

Beatriz got her second in the 86th minute when she created a yard of space in the box and curled the ball into the far corner.

Lotta Schelin got a consolation goal for the Swedes with two minutes remaining.