The return of Ada Hegerberg: Why Norway's star is set to break British hearts

Plenty happened between Ada Hegerberg’s decision to stop playing for Norway and her triumphant return.

In 2018, she became the first-ever winner of the Ballon d’Or Feminin, over a year after the Molde-born striker ceased representing her national side over perceived inequalities within the Norwegian Football Federation and “a huge difference over evaluations and how we should move forward”. She was 22.

Since then… well, let’s just say that change has been afoot. The NFF has since elected its first female president in 120 years of being – and the former international, Lise Klaveness, has got to work quickly. Klaveness even took on Gianni Infantino at April’s FIFA Congress, declaring that world football’s governing body needed to do far better when it came to, er, pretty much everything from migrant workers at Qatar 2022 to “human rights, equality and democracy” that led to the Gulf state getting hosting rights in the first place.

Hegerberg was convinced. When she finally returned to the Norway setup in March, the 26-year-old marked her second coming with a 40-minute hat-trick against Kosovo. It was as devastating as it was inevitable for the deadliest striker in world football.

But that interim between Euro 2017 and Euro 2022 has been tricky. Although Hegerberg set the Champions League scoring record in October 2019 after becoming the first woman to net a hat-trick in the final, she suffered an agonising ruptured ACL the following January which slammed the brakes on a season where she was averaging well over a goal a game. Rehabilitation became an ever-steeper mountain to climb: with the world locked down as COVID-19 bit hard, Hegerberg suffered another setback – a stress fracture to her left tibia in September 2020.

In all, it took 20 months of patience and recovery to make her return in October – so it’s no wonder that Hegerberg has since hired a new nutritionist and researched prevention programmes to make that time indoors a project on how to become even better.

“I will never, ever take football for granted again,” she admitted. The world has changed around her, not least the rapidly evolving landscape of women’s football – indeed, even Lyon briefly lost their stranglehold on the Champions League and Ligue 1 without her. 

Thankfully for Hegerberg, though, not for long. There may have been a fear that injury could leave her behind, but in 2022 both she and her ruthless club side stormed back to former glories. While Barcelona and Alexia Putellas shone in her absence, Lyon returned to the summit by beating them 3-1 in a dominant Champions League final win in May.

Hegerberg scored – because of course she did. In all, 16 goals in 26 matches this season represented a steady if unspectacular tally by her own lofty standards, but Les Fenottes’ icon showed up in their biggest games: she netted in each European knockout tie Lyon encountered, including deadlock-breaking second-leg strikes in the quarter-final against Juventus and their all-French semi with PSG.

Now, however, all roads point to England for Hegerberg as she looks to inspire 2013 runners-up Norway back to prominence. Her last tournament experience with them in 2017 was an unmitigated disaster, but the Gresshoppene are now in a group with nemeses England, who they’ll face in their second match before a packed Amex Stadium in Brighton.

Hegerberg won’t mind giving up the spotlight for this Euros’ hosts, though. When the striker originally announced her decision to leave international football without a full explanation five years ago, the criticism rained down hard from even her own team-mates. An interview with Norwegian magazine Josimar later served up her side of the story, but some still blamed her for undermining a national team in need anyway. Back then, Hegerberg couldn’t win either way. Now she can on her terms.

As she explained of her hiatus, “I hope it never happens to another player, [getting] put in a position where you need to make a choice like that. But at the same time, I’ve kind of moved on as well.”

The whole of football has – not least Norway’s football association. Their male and female players have been paid the same since December 2017, following an agreement that doubled the women’s pot, but it was always about more than just the money for Hegerberg. Under new president Klaveness, Lyon’s superstar is finally seeing the kind of progress that she can get behind.

Now it’s her who’s playing catch-up – but luckily for Norway, Hegerberg is often at her most dangerous when lurking on the shoulder and waiting to pounce. That’s one thing that’s never changed. Lionesses, beware…