”The national team has never been a dream”
Hallagård looking to stop after the EM-success
NANTES. She has had one of the strangest landslagskarriärer.
But on Wednesday, the end.
Elin Hallagård looking to stop with the handball – six months after the mästerskapsdebuten.
– It is difficult to get together a life puzzle, ” says 29-year-old.
Elin Hallagård has been responsible for one of the most remarkable landslagskarriärerna we’ve seen in the women handball team.
Göteborgskan was with in five träningslandskamper in the autumn of 2011, when she still played in the Heid.
Then, she did not pull on landslagströjan again until Thursday against Montenegro. She had landed at lunch, blixtinkallad the evening before in the squad for Sabina Jacobsen was in doubt for the game due to injury.
“It was in the middle of bullbaket at home so it was only to toss it where lussekattsdegen and go to France,” she said with a laugh after the game.
Just before the return got Hallagård out that she would go straight into the starting lineup. 47 minutes into the made she got put on the stands after his third expulsion, and called the red card.
In Sunday’s match, she was back in the starting lineup in the defense and was one of Sweden’s best players when she and the rest of the defensive shut down of the reigning world champions from France.
An astonishing development given that the Hallagård had just done a match and a training session with Anna Lagerquist next to them in the stone in the middle.
” I have the world’s best coach on the bench. Every time I sit on the bench so I get feedback from Sabina, says Hallagård.
the Father did not dare to watch
Actually is Hallagård on maternity leave. She and my partner Peter had a daughter, Stina, the 23rd of december last year.
” I work part-time as a physical therapist is on maternity leave from it now.
Stina someone in the know that you are here?
” No. I do not think she even recognizes me when I call on Facetime. It is a little boring.
if you Have received a lot of reactions from home otherwise?
– Yes, oh my god. The whole family sat bänkad in front of the tv yesterday. Yes, not dad. He dared not watch the match because he was too nervous. He sat and watched it in the day instead when I called him.
Personally, she goes around at spelarhotellet with a sense of unreality.
– There is still a pinch-me-in-the-arm-feeling it over here. I probably have not made it yet. When I come home, I learn to think, ”what was it I was”.
There were seven years between the landskamperna. But Hallagård – which, since 2012, played in Sävehof, had taken five national CHAMPIONSHIPS and has played several Champions League seasons – has not been bitter about never getting selected in the national team during these years. Far from.
” It sounds well as I’m lying when I say it, but I have never had it as a dream to play in the national team. Many think that it is weird and I can feel that it is a pity and strange. But I have never burned so much of the handball that I want to devote my life to it on the way. When it has been landslagssamlingar we have been available from the club. I have appreciated and needed. It had been too much otherwise.
in Parallel with the handbollskarriären, she has trained physical therapist for three years, then worked part-time there, renovated a house and had children.
– There have been many other things in life that I have wanted to put my focus on.
A reunion with old lagkompisar
You feel very relaxed with the thought that you are thrown straight into it here and make mästerskapsdebut?
” It’s a wonderful location and I may be on it göttigaste now. The others have been gathered a long time and I want to take responsibility and shed some energy. I don’t need to feel any pressure but it is like He (head coach Signell) said to me: a asgött location to just take a dump in everything and do what I can.
She has played with almost half the squad in Sävehof, even if only Olivia Mellegård is left when the rest has become the federation.
” It has been a small reunion here with all of them I played with in Sävehof, but haven’t met in a long time.
But had Hallagård been thrown into the same situation in the world CUP only a year ago, does she not believe that she had not passed the equal gallant.
Until Stina was born, she had often performance anxiety on the pitch.
” I am not going to just blame that I’m not burned for handball and, therefore, not taken me to so long that perhaps I had been able to. I have to be nervous, just like her father, and put very easily a lot of pressure on myself. Just a year ago, I had thought that this had been extremely hard that I would hit and show a lot of people that I have a place.
” I have a much, much calmer approach now. Maybe it’s because I became a mother and gained perspective. Now I do as best I can and as you get to see how long it lasts.
does it Make you a better player?
” Yes, I believe. I have a few levels as I want in Sävehof.
Had decided to stop
Hallagård had decided to stop with handball when she became pregnant.
” that was The idea. I had been thinking about quitting even if I had not become pregnant. It had become too much in my life. It was too stressful and felt like handball, perhaps, took more than it gave. Then when I became pregnant, I felt it was a good time.
But at the end of the pregnancy she had changed her mind.
” the Body felt good and I felt that I could be better and so I lacked the team and lagsammanhållningen. It was a bit of a identitetsfråga also. I had always been ”handball-Elin” the whole of life.
She came back to the playoffs and in the CHAMPIONSHIP final, she struck the final fit to the Ida Odén, which settled the final with his last shot in his career.
Then wrote Hallagård on a 1+1 contract with Sävehof.
But this season might be the last.
Now, she reflects on the quit again. Thus can the match on Wednesday against Russia to be her last cap on the Sweden don’t go further in the CHAMPIONSHIP.
– It is difficult to get together a life puzzle if I am going to play handball, work, be a mother and keep a relationship. It is easy that it takes more than it gives in the periods and the periods are tough.
But the last time you thought about quitting the job so undone you?
” I am getting older and older. There are other things also that I want to do.
Influenced your decision something that it’s been so good here at EM?
” No. This is a very, very fun experience, and I will have with me a great many positive experiences to spring in Sävehof. But I’m not going any further than may, ” says Elin Hallagård.