Injuries rose, but women players want to keep tackling

Researchers at Lund University found that injuries reported to insurance companies nearly doubled after women’s ice hockey allowed body-checking in 2022. Yet the players themselves do not believe tackling leads to more injuries, and they want the physical play to remain.

That contrast leads Johan Esk’s weekly list of the biggest sports stories. Lionel Messi has finished playing for Argentina, Esk writes, although he criticizes Messi’s teammates for embarrassing themselves after the captain’s final international, the World Cup final against Spain.

BK Häcken’s latest sale, Monica Jusu Bah’s move to Manchester United, brings the club’s total sales of women players this year to about 30 million kronor, according to sporting director Christian Lundström. In volleyball, Sweden does not have the world’s best team, Esk says, but may have its best player in Isabelle Haak. Sweden still produced an impressive performance and shook Italy, the dominant world number one, in the European Championship quarterfinal.

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It is time to end this fantastic journey as a professional athlete.

Football also brought Dejan Kulusevski’s return to full training after 477 days injured. In skiing, Finland’s Kerttu Niskanen announced the end of her career, while Frida Karlsson reacted with surprise to the news that the United States has no women’s skier in its senior national team during its generational transition. Esk also notes that financier Christer Gardell, who promised 100 million kronor to Swedish tennis if the federation board was replaced, was cleared by the National Sports Board, but has not paid the money.

The list includes SVT presenter Mats Nyström hosting Sportspegeln for the 500th time and Hollywood star Gillian Anderson becoming an investor in FC Rosengård through Crux Football. Esk ends on a political issue in sport: while Russia continues bombing civilian targets in Ukraine, the doors of international sport are opening further to Russian athletes, with “neutral” Russian skiers potentially being allowed back in fully.

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Not a single one? Oh.