Former national team captain Peter Gerhardsson revealed it a couple of days after the EC exit against England on penalties: Hanna Bennison, who sat on the bench in the quarter-finals, had not been available for the game.
Now the midfielder says that it was a bigger injury than she thought during the summer championships in Switzerland.
Bennison stands in the sun at the national team’s hotel in Spanish Marbella, ahead of Friday’s semi-final meeting in the Nations League. She is in the new confederation captain Tony Gustavsson’s first squad, despite a season upload that hardly turned out as she had planned – and in the wake of the lack of playing time in the new club team Real Madrid.
– It means a lot to gain the trust and be selected here, she says.
It was in the group stage against Germany in the European Championship (4–1) as Bennison was injured in the first half.
She thought it was a “normal sprained foot” and drove on purely on adrenaline. Later it turned out that she had suffered a so-called syndesmus injury, grade two, which involves a partial rupture of the ligament between the tibia and calf.
– This means that I had to do rehab when I came to Real as well. And I missed the whole preseason there, a total of maybe two months until I could be with the team.
The period was tough, says she, who in 2021 was named the world’s greatest female soccer talent.
– It is clear that when you are new to a team, you want to be able to show yourself immediately at training. But I also feel that I received very good help with the rehab and it is important that you come back and feel one hundred percent as well.
However, the fact that she played the entire Germany match in the EC did not affect the extent of the injury, she believes.
– No, I don’t think it mattered. I think the damage was already done.
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