Who or who is training the Swedish men's and women's national teams in cross-country skiing in the coming season is still not clear, at least not officially.

This week the eyes were directed at the Norwegian, Kristian Skogstad, who from 2016 to 2019 was the head of Team Veidekke Northern Norway and, among other things, has trained the Norwegian national team skaters Erik Valnes and Anna Svendsen.

"Don't want to go into it"

But when SVT Sport talks to Kristian Skogstad, he says that in the days he declined the offer.

- I refused. It just didn't fit right now. I have a family with three children that I have to take into consideration.

Was it the women's or men's team you were offered a job?

- I don't want to go into that. But we had a good dialogue and I am impressed with what Sweden has going on. It felt exciting. That was perhaps the most difficult choice I made.

National team manager Anders Byström confirms this.

- He couldn't, given the family situation. I have every respect for that, Byström tells SVT Sport.

Another coach who has been contacted is Ola Ravald, something that Expressen was the first to tell. However, Ravald tells SVT Sport that he has not received any concrete offer, but confirms that he has had discussions with Byström.

ARCHIVE: New length manager: “Good communication is the most important (April 2, 2020)

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Anders Byström together with Hanna Öberg during the past season. Photo: BILDBYRÅN