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Katja · @applessquabble

9th Oct 2015 from TwitLonger

The translated interview with Hegerberg. The Potsdam part is really interesting, so that is what I have translated (plus her signing for Lyon):

After one season at Stabæk, the Hegerberg sisters left for the German top team Turbine Potsdam. The club had won the CL three years earlier. But the Sunndals-sisters first adventure abroad was no fairy-tale. Andrine left the club for Göteborg after just 6 months, and Ada left the following year. She doesn’t have much positive to say about the stay, and she has long been hesitant to talk about it – she will rather just forget about it. She came in flying high after a cup win, and was a star in Norwegian football. But in Germany she was simply put down again, mostly thanks to the coach Bernd Schröder.

-It was pretty much about a coach who decided everything, and who was totally erratic. You had nothing to say, you were not allowed to show emotions, you could not be yourself in that club, and that is when you lose your personality – both as a player and as an individual. The culture was very strict and hard. It’s a little hard to talk about it, because it’s so distant, even if it was just a year ago. I was mentally dejected. Firstly, we trained insanely much, so much quantity without quality. There could be four sessions in a day. People almost passed out. I was injured quite a lot – In Lyon I have been ready all the time. The physiotherapist didn’t stand up for the injured players, because he was afraid of the coach. It was "survival of the fittest." And then there was an environment where no one dared to stand up because they were afraid of the trainer, thus creating a cowardly environment within the team. People became so uncertain that they are doing everything to sell out our other players, because they wanted to climb the ladder themselves, says Ada.

- I was supposed to get some help with combining football and school, but I never got that. Once when I was injured, the coach wanted to take me to Italy to play in the Champions League, even though I wasn’t able to pay. He did that just to be difficult. So I went to his office and asked if I could please stay home to work on my school, and if I could go home to Oslo, the best would have been being at Wang (My note: A sports school in Oslo). It would not have made a difference, since they were supposed to be in Italy anyway. But he said "no, you ca’t. You can stay here, but if I find out that you have been somewhere else than in Potsdam this weekend, you're in trouble. "I was so angry and emotionally destroyed. Finally I just had to go, she says and adds:

- Now I am talking about very detailed things that no one else has talked about in the media, because people who have been in Turbine Potsdam would prefer to put it behind them. But it was a good experience. I'm really glad that I chose to go to Germany. It has taught me so much about history and culture, not just football. I grew a lot as a person. I got there and was greeted with elbows in training,

After the break with Potsdam, everything was pointing to Ada being reunited with Andrine in Göteborg. But then a French giant came calling.

Lyon had won the French league 8 times in a row and CL in 2011 and 2012. Now they needed reinforcements.

-We noticed Ada when she played against us for Potsdam in CL. She toyed with us. So when we found out she was having troubles with her coach, we were interested, says Lyon coach Prêcheur.

When she was told about the interest from Lyon, Ada was on a girls trip to Barcelona.
- When my agent told me about Lyon for the first time, I didn’t really believe it. I thought «wow, Olympique Lyonnais, how interested could they even be?». My agent told me they wanted me to be there a week later. I asked to talk to the coach on the phone, and the assistant coach, Sonia Bompastor, phoned me, because she knew English. I was in the hotelroom with the girls when she called, and everyone was really flustered. It was Sonia Bompastor, seriously, she was a great player. And then I went directly from the girls trip to Lyon, and got a great impression. It went fast, suddenly I had signed. Since then my life has been like a dream, Ada says.

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