It is easy to understand those who want to keep a low profile and tone down expectations before their first major championship. But it is nothing for Häcken forward Johanna Rytting Kaneryd.
– No, I’m not withdrawn at all. I’m not such a player. I’m a player who wants a lot, and it’s almost like you have to hold back because I often want a little too much maybe, she says.
After the successful entry into the European Championship rematch against Brazil – the 25-year-old he barely got in before she had scored her first national team goal – she has been highlighted as a possible starting player in Saturday’s premiere against the Netherlands.
– It’s great that I have done so well that people have noticed it. It just gives me a push to keep trying to perform. Then it is Peter (Gerhardsson, the national team captain) who takes out the team, so we will see, says Rytting Kaneryd.
Suffering from performance anxiety
She radiates confidence. But not in the form of any excessive cockiness, rather Johanna Rytting Kaneryd seems confident in her own ability.
This has not always been the case.
During the camp in Båstad, Johanna Rytting Kaneryd told, among others Today’s news and Göteborgs-Posten about how she was previously plagued with performance anxiety. Among other things, she described how challenging it was to move to the big investment Tyresö as a 14-year-old, with players like Marta and Caroline Seger.
Among other things, she managed to sit on the bench in a Champions League final before the club went bankrupt.
Nowadays, she does not put as much pressure on herself. Instead, she carries her experiences with her as a strength.
– I think it is very important that you have it in your luggage, she says.
She does not feel any nervousness at all before the European Championships.
– No not really. I’m just expectant. I almost never feel nervous anymore. Sometimes you wish you had a little nervousness, but I do not feel nervous.
Dribbles further
Rytting Kaneryd’s goal against Brazil was a demonstration of her strengths on the pitch: speed, technique and an ability to get past opponents on her own. But maybe it also showed how she developed the mental part of the game.
Sometimes it is a dribbling too much from the 25-year-old’s side, but better that – and to fail – than no one at all, she says.
– I know it will not help me to dig myself down and hide. I will not succeed in all my dribbles, and if I just stop doing it for it, it will not benefit me.
– I will continue to do so, and to challenge and drive the ball and use my speed. That is what I want to contribute.