The UEFA Women’s Euro championship, which started yesterday, is to be lit up by one of the brightest stars in women’s soccer thanks to Ada Hegerberg’s decision to end a self-imposed exile from international duty with Norway.
The all-time top goalscorer in the UEFA Women’s Champions League stepped away from the international scene in 2017, citing concerns over the inequality of treatment given to men’s and women’s teams by the Norwegian federation.
Five years on, she made her comeback in March, and in typical fashion scored a hat-trick in a 5-1 thrashing of Kosovo.
Photo: AFP
“It was important for me for it to be authentic, that it was natural for everyone involved,” Hegerberg said of her decision to return. “It was a great thing. Personally and also collectively, I think.”
Even without Hegerberg, Norway made it to the quarter-finals of the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup.
Now with one of the most prolific goalscorers in the game united alongside Barcelona’s Caroline Graham Hansen in attack, Martin Sjogren’s side can again dream about going all the way at the Women’s Euro in England.
“She is world-class and has delivered goal after goal on the biggest football stages for a number of years,” Sjogren said. “Of course, getting her back means a lot to the Norwegian national team.”
The 26-year-old’s return also points to the progress that has been made off the field in her absence.
A major influence in Hegerberg’s decision was the arrival of Lise Klaveness as president of the Norwegian Football Federation (NFF).
Klaveness, a former teammate of Hegerberg, had been outspoken in her own playing career about inequality among the men’s and women’s teams.
The NFF is now among the federations offering equal pay to their men’s and women’s internationals.
A huge gulf in prize money still exits between the men’s and women’s game.
UEFA is to dish out just 16 million euros (US$16.3 million) to the federations involved at the Women’s Euro, compared with 331 million euros for the Men’s Euro last year.
However, UEFA head of women’s soccer Nadine Kessler defended that gap by highlighting a fivefold increase in spending on hosting the tournament, much of which has gone on improved accommodation and training facilities for the sides involved.
Another factor behind Hegerberg’s change of mind was missing 21 months of action between January 2020 and October last year due to two serious injuries. After an anterior cruciate ligament rupture, her comeback was halted by a stress fracture in her tibia.
Hegerberg did not take long to find her rhythm, winning her sixth Champions League title in May and scoring in the final as Olympique Lyonnais beat Barcelona 3-1, but the long layoff played its part in prompting a rethink over her international future.
That change of heart could change the course of the whole tournament.
In 11 appearances at the Women’s Euro, Norway have reached the final six times and can now count themselves among the contenders once again.
A blockbuster clash with England on Monday will be one of the highlights of the group stage, but both are likely to be confident of reaching the quarter-finals from a section also including Austria and tournament debutants Northern Ireland, who Norway face first today.
“We are keeping a fine balance between being realistic, but also ambitious,” Hegerberg said.
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