Soccer-Norway's Hegerberg seeks to inspire as Euros enter knockout phase

The Star

4 days ago

NEUCHATEL, Switzerland (Reuters) -The women's game has come a long way since the last time Norway played a knockout game at the Euros, agonisingly losing the 2013 final 1-0 to Germany with a callow, 18-year-old Ada Hegerberg, now team captain, starting up front.
At that tournament in Sweden, a combined total of 28,814 spectators saw Norway's group games, a number dwarfed by the 34,063 who saw their 2025 opener, a 2-1 win over hosts Switzerland in which Hegerberg equalised with a bullet header, and the 30-year-old has played a greater role than most in the growth of the game.
"You've got to take care of the next generation as well. We're here to inspire, we're here to be open, and that's what we want to do," Hegerberg told Reuters at a training session open to fans near the team's base in Neuchatel where locals had come in their droves to watch.
Together with vice-captain Caroline Graham Hansen and former captain Maren Mjelde, Hegerberg came so close to winning in 2013, but German keeper Nadine Angerer saved two penalties to thwart the young stars.
"Me and Caro (Graham Hansen), we haven't talked a lot about that game when we were younger, because I don't think we realised then what an opportunity that was. But we talk about it today and we're like, damn it, we were one goal away from winning a Euros," Hegerberg explained.
"And I think people tend to forget that, but you know it was an incredible experience. Things have changed a lot since, football has changed a lot, but, yeah, it's starting to become a long, long time ago, and we've experienced a whole deal after that."
To say that Hegerberg has experienced a lot since then is something of an understatement; she has won 10 French league titles and six Champions League titles with Olympique Lyonnais and a slew of individual awards including the first women's Ballon d'Or in 2018.
She has also spent almost five years in self-imposed exile from the national team in protest at how the Norwegian Football Federation treated women's football. She returned in 2022 and has since taken over the captain's armband from Mjelde, ushering in a new era.
"It's a huge responsibility, something that I take very seriously, very inspired to take on that role as well. And you know, Caro is my vice captain, and we've been in the game for a long while," she said.
"It's all about transmitting experience calmness when that's needed, power when that's needed, you know, I learn an awful lot, being in that role... I'm myself with them and authenticity is the only way."
In contrast to many teams in the modern game, the Norwegians continue to be very open, taking time to sign autographs and take selfies after games and training, and splitting the players into groups to make them available to the media.
For Hegerberg, that openness is key to growing the game.
"It's our day off after a game but I need to get there (to the fans) as soon as possible as well," she said, looking over her shoulder at the throngs of young admirers waiting for a moment with her.
"We're still coming here because it's important people are showing up to see us. We want to give back. I think the whole (Norwegian) federation, with Lisa Klaveness running it, has this vibe that we want to bring as many people into this vibe."
Her effect on young female fans is visible around the training pitch in Neuchatel as young girls with their hair fixed in Hegerberg's signature power braid wait for her and, as always with the iconic striker, there is a story behind it that has its roots in attention to detail and her will to win.
"I can almost do it blind now," she says of her hairstyle. "It comes from the day when my dad told me that I was touching my hair too much while playing football.
"I was around maybe eight and he was like, 'you spend too much energy touching your hair, so you've got to do something about it', and that's where the braid came in."
That braid has followed her from her first team in Norway through a Women's Euro final and now again into the knockout stage where Norway meet Italy in Geneva on Wednesday, and where more girls in the stands will mimic her style.
"It's fantastic," she said, before taking off the microphone used in the interview and going to greet her fans.
(Reporting by Philip O'Connor; editing by Clare Fallon)